7 ms·

I hear a lot about Flint's children but what about the adults? The lack of reporting on the adult population is really freaking me out. Like, I want to know if

I hear a lot about Flint's children but what about the adults? The lack of reporting on the adult population is really freaking me out. Like, I want to know if people with power, or people providing vital civil services have lead poisoning. I am really concerned that the police and teachers and postal workers and city council and parents etc. might all be mentally impaired. I imagine the Mayor of Flint with lead poisoning and I just hear a voice in back of my head quietly whispering "Caligula. Caligula."

empath75 7y ago
I don’t think lead has as much of an impact on fully formed brains.
- deleted 7y ago
  [deleted]
- derek1800 7y ago
  But how long has led existed in the pipes? People now grown up could have been impacted when young.
  - ianai 7y ago
    The contamination is the result of the water being drawn from the nearby river. The river water eroded the lead solder in the towns pipes. It started in 2014. All per Wikipedia.
  - wil421 7y ago
    You misunderstand the situation. As the other commenter stated Flint decided to restart their own water treatment due to costs. They were not prepared to fully treat the water from the nearby river. They also ignored the water plant manager. A lot of people don’t realize there was (and maybe still is) a huge outbreak of Legionnaires disease. Somehow the city suppressed the news about it.
  - bluGill 7y ago
    I have a book from the 1920's that describes what additives to put into water to prevent it from eroding the lead pipes. Of course back they were only concerned about the pipes and didn't know about (or at least didn't admit) the health problems. Lead used to be very common, up until the 1980s lead was used for nearly all pipes in some way (generally only in solder though so not much - though I don't know how harmful that amount is. Pipes in the ground are generally expected to last for a long time (last I heard Boston still had wood pipes from before the revolution in use), so it is safe to say all towns have lead in their water system somewhere. Thus all water supplies should be managing to reduce the ability of their water supply to reduce lead. I would also suggest that you should go to your town board and say your number one issue is getting rid of all the lead - and you are fine with reverting major roads to gravel to pay for it. (and seriously consider what other services are can be eliminated to find more money)
- jacobwilliamroy 7y ago
  So I found an NIEH article which says chronic exposure in adults can lead to memory and concentration problems: https://www.niehs.nih.gov/health/topics/agents/lead/index.cfm https://www.niehs.nih.gov/health/topics/agents/lead/index.cf... The city leaded the water supply in april 2014, and the wikipedia timeline says that no one was reporting the elevated lead until february 2015. Even then, the city denied that there was even a lead problem all the way up through september 2015. Do any medical professions know what "chronic" means in this context? Would 17 months be chronic for someone who was cooking and showering and drinking leaded water?
- jgoewert 7y ago
  The workers for the Standard Oil Company's TEL building would like to have a word with you. Admittedly, they did have a way higher exposure than anyone else, but we definitely were spewing enough into the atmosphere to affect everyone.
ianai 7y ago
There’s a lack of reporting on Flint, period. For whatever reason, lead and water contamination stories don’t stick in the news cycle. People just aren’t as concerned about it. This is of course horrible. They’re not the only municipality with lead in its water. But people spend a lot more time and money on the painful wart on their neck than the removed plight of others.
- zaroth 7y ago
  Probably 90% of the country know the story of Flint’s lead contaminated water. It absolutely dominated the news cycle for weeks, and continues to make waves. It must be the most highly reported incident of lead contaminated water in history.
  - snagglegaggle 7y ago
    And there are apparently more across the nation, with a notable number in affluent CA suburbs.
- sokoloff 7y ago
  That actually seems fairly reasonable to me. If there's something causing daily pain to me or someone in my family, I'm much more likely to spend time, attention, and money on that than on something that is another city's responsibility and is not affecting me directly. This is a natural and beneficial form of decentralization. I don't expect you to be concerned that my grandmother broke her hip. It's properly a big deal to my family, but not even a blip for yours. I want daily/several times per week updates on her progress; you don't. We all have a finite amount of time, attention, and money, and while I probably know more about the origin of the Flint water situation than the average American (owing to the latter being near zero rather than deep expertise on my part), I'll be honest that I'm more worried about the water quality in Cambridge, MA and in the schools my kids attend. There are millions of unfortunate or even tragic events unfolding in the world in any given week. It's unreasonable to assume that everyone should care about all of them or judge the situation to be "of course horrible" when we don't. We'd get nothing done as a society if we stopped to mourn every tragedy everywhere or to get weekly updates on years-long remediation efforts. I sincerely hope that the city of Flint is able to address the entirely city-inflicted (though funding related) water quality issues for its residents. If they aren't able to do it alone, I hope they ask for and get help from the encompassing county, state, or feds. At the same time, I conclude that there's nothing with a productive return-on-time that I should be doing, because people who are far more informed, more educated on water treatment specifics, have devoted >100 times the amount of time as I have to understanding the issue, and are in a position (spatially and with authority) to make productive decisions are working on the problem.
CalRobert 7y ago
Sometimes it's remarkable to think almost everyone (certainly city-dwellers, at least) in their mid-50's and older grew up with low-level lead poisoning from exhaust.
- 83457 7y ago
  https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lead%E2%80%93crime_hypothesis https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lead%E2%80%93crime_hypothesis
- mumblemumble 7y ago
  I guess. . . as a city-dweller, it's still a daily thing for me. All that lead settled on the ground, and it's still there. So I need to be much more careful about letting my kids play in the dirt in our backyard than I do when we're visiting friends in the country. Some studies have suggested it's a bigger source of exposure in kids than lead-based paint or contaminated water. It's also one of the main reasons why the CDC recommends that everyone take off their shoes when they enter the house.
  - CalRobert 7y ago
    Country isn't great either, we used to spray lead acetate on orchards for pest control
dfxm12 7y ago
Like, I want to know if people with power, or people providing vital civil services have lead poisoning. What do you mean by power? The people, even the adults, of Flint have no power. This is how they ended up with poor water in the first place.
- jacobwilliamroy 7y ago
  responsibility is the word I should have used.
opencl 7y ago
Basically all adults in the US that grew up prior to the leaded gasoline ban have some degree of lead poisoning.
mumblemumble 7y ago
The adults who are running Flint are probably more lead poisoned than the kids. Not because of Flint's drinking water, but because they grew up in the 70s and earlier. In 1976, the median amount of lead in the blood of young children was 15 µg/dL. This was considered normal and healthy at the time. In the Flint crisis, the kids who were exposed to lead were generally testing between 5 and 10 µg/dL. source: https://www.statnews.com/2016/01/22/flint-children-lead-exposure/ https://www.statnews.com/2016/01/22/flint-children-lead-expo...
- mumblemumble 7y ago
  Also, just to pile it on: levels of up to 10 µg/dL weren't considered a problem according to US guidelines until 2012. This is not by way of meaning to be blasé about the situation. More to highlight that even the country's highest authorities on the subject were enough laxer about it until recently enough that you really do need to be on guard about it for yourself. A 7-year-old CDC guideline will almost certainly have trickled down to your pediatrician's practices, but it probably hasn't had enough time to have much impact on your local building codes or any other local government policies. 8 short years ago, what happened in Flint would not have been considered a problem.

empath75 7y ago

I don’t think lead has as much of an impact on fully formed brains.

deleted 7y ago
[deleted]
derek1800 7y ago
But how long has led existed in the pipes? People now grown up could have been impacted when young.
- ianai 7y ago
  The contamination is the result of the water being drawn from the nearby river. The river water eroded the lead solder in the towns pipes. It started in 2014. All per Wikipedia.
- wil421 7y ago
  You misunderstand the situation. As the other commenter stated Flint decided to restart their own water treatment due to costs. They were not prepared to fully treat the water from the nearby river. They also ignored the water plant manager. A lot of people don’t realize there was (and maybe still is) a huge outbreak of Legionnaires disease. Somehow the city suppressed the news about it.
- bluGill 7y ago
  I have a book from the 1920's that describes what additives to put into water to prevent it from eroding the lead pipes. Of course back they were only concerned about the pipes and didn't know about (or at least didn't admit) the health problems. Lead used to be very common, up until the 1980s lead was used for nearly all pipes in some way (generally only in solder though so not much - though I don't know how harmful that amount is. Pipes in the ground are generally expected to last for a long time (last I heard Boston still had wood pipes from before the revolution in use), so it is safe to say all towns have lead in their water system somewhere. Thus all water supplies should be managing to reduce the ability of their water supply to reduce lead. I would also suggest that you should go to your town board and say your number one issue is getting rid of all the lead - and you are fine with reverting major roads to gravel to pay for it. (and seriously consider what other services are can be eliminated to find more money)
jacobwilliamroy 7y ago
So I found an NIEH article which says chronic exposure in adults can lead to memory and concentration problems: https://www.niehs.nih.gov/health/topics/agents/lead/index.cfm https://www.niehs.nih.gov/health/topics/agents/lead/index.cf... The city leaded the water supply in april 2014, and the wikipedia timeline says that no one was reporting the elevated lead until february 2015. Even then, the city denied that there was even a lead problem all the way up through september 2015. Do any medical professions know what "chronic" means in this context? Would 17 months be chronic for someone who was cooking and showering and drinking leaded water?
jgoewert 7y ago
The workers for the Standard Oil Company's TEL building would like to have a word with you. Admittedly, they did have a way higher exposure than anyone else, but we definitely were spewing enough into the atmosphere to affect everyone.

ianai 7y ago

There’s a lack of reporting on Flint, period. For whatever reason, lead and water contamination stories don’t stick in the news cycle. People just aren’t as concerned about it. This is of course horrible. They’re not the only municipality with lead in its water. But people spend a lot more time and money on the painful wart on their neck than the removed plight of others.

zaroth 7y ago
Probably 90% of the country know the story of Flint’s lead contaminated water. It absolutely dominated the news cycle for weeks, and continues to make waves. It must be the most highly reported incident of lead contaminated water in history.
- snagglegaggle 7y ago
  And there are apparently more across the nation, with a notable number in affluent CA suburbs.
sokoloff 7y ago
That actually seems fairly reasonable to me. If there's something causing daily pain to me or someone in my family, I'm much more likely to spend time, attention, and money on that than on something that is another city's responsibility and is not affecting me directly. This is a natural and beneficial form of decentralization. I don't expect you to be concerned that my grandmother broke her hip. It's properly a big deal to my family, but not even a blip for yours. I want daily/several times per week updates on her progress; you don't. We all have a finite amount of time, attention, and money, and while I probably know more about the origin of the Flint water situation than the average American (owing to the latter being near zero rather than deep expertise on my part), I'll be honest that I'm more worried about the water quality in Cambridge, MA and in the schools my kids attend. There are millions of unfortunate or even tragic events unfolding in the world in any given week. It's unreasonable to assume that everyone should care about all of them or judge the situation to be "of course horrible" when we don't. We'd get nothing done as a society if we stopped to mourn every tragedy everywhere or to get weekly updates on years-long remediation efforts. I sincerely hope that the city of Flint is able to address the entirely city-inflicted (though funding related) water quality issues for its residents. If they aren't able to do it alone, I hope they ask for and get help from the encompassing county, state, or feds. At the same time, I conclude that there's nothing with a productive return-on-time that I should be doing, because people who are far more informed, more educated on water treatment specifics, have devoted >100 times the amount of time as I have to understanding the issue, and are in a position (spatially and with authority) to make productive decisions are working on the problem.

CalRobert 7y ago

Sometimes it's remarkable to think almost everyone (certainly city-dwellers, at least) in their mid-50's and older grew up with low-level lead poisoning from exhaust.

83457 7y ago
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lead%E2%80%93crime_hypothesis https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lead%E2%80%93crime_hypothesis
mumblemumble 7y ago
I guess. . . as a city-dweller, it's still a daily thing for me. All that lead settled on the ground, and it's still there. So I need to be much more careful about letting my kids play in the dirt in our backyard than I do when we're visiting friends in the country. Some studies have suggested it's a bigger source of exposure in kids than lead-based paint or contaminated water. It's also one of the main reasons why the CDC recommends that everyone take off their shoes when they enter the house.
- CalRobert 7y ago
  Country isn't great either, we used to spray lead acetate on orchards for pest control

dfxm12 7y ago

Like, I want to know if people with power, or people providing vital civil services have lead poisoning. What do you mean by power? The people, even the adults, of Flint have no power. This is how they ended up with poor water in the first place.

jacobwilliamroy 7y ago
responsibility is the word I should have used.

opencl 7y ago

Basically all adults in the US that grew up prior to the leaded gasoline ban have some degree of lead poisoning.

mumblemumble 7y ago

The adults who are running Flint are probably more lead poisoned than the kids. Not because of Flint's drinking water, but because they grew up in the 70s and earlier. In 1976, the median amount of lead in the blood of young children was 15 µg/dL. This was considered normal and healthy at the time. In the Flint crisis, the kids who were exposed to lead were generally testing between 5 and 10 µg/dL. source: https://www.statnews.com/2016/01/22/flint-children-lead-exposure/ https://www.statnews.com/2016/01/22/flint-children-lead-expo...

mumblemumble 7y ago
Also, just to pile it on: levels of up to 10 µg/dL weren't considered a problem according to US guidelines until 2012. This is not by way of meaning to be blasé about the situation. More to highlight that even the country's highest authorities on the subject were enough laxer about it until recently enough that you really do need to be on guard about it for yourself. A 7-year-old CDC guideline will almost certainly have trickled down to your pediatrician's practices, but it probably hasn't had enough time to have much impact on your local building codes or any other local government policies. 8 short years ago, what happened in Flint would not have been considered a problem.