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Lead exposure in last century shrunk IQ scores of half of Americans: study

today.duke.edu

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Re: Lead exposure in last century shrunk IQ scores of half of Americans: study

#161

Post by nostromo »

miketery wrote: post #20
softwarebeware wrote: post #10

It makes me angry to think of how wreckless the generations before millenials were. Lead's risks and damages were well-known long before 1996. And they still didn't ban it until then.

Same goes for sugar. We know the dangers it poses, we are also seeing how much it increases risk of death due to covid. I don't think we should be surpsied, as much as pushing to regulate this garbage. As an aside, Michelle Obama's campaign when Obama was in office was about improvement children's health. Her focus was going to be on nutrition (lunch food). Shortly thereafter Coke and Pepsi came in with "donations" a…

You can’t ban everything…

Marijuanna and sugar and a million other potential vices like alcohol and video games should be available.

But we should teach kids discipline, critical thinking, and impulse control - rather than playing whack-a-mole with every vice that comes along.

Re: Lead exposure in last century shrunk IQ scores of half of Americans: study

#162

Post by selimthegrim »

yojo wrote: post #116
softwarebeware wrote: post #10

It makes me angry to think of how wreckless the generations before millenials were. Lead's risks and damages were well-known long before 1996. And they still didn't ban it until then.

It didn’t even stop then. My own city (Portland) has been regularly exceeding EPA lead action levels since 1998[1]. All they need to do is treat the water to raise ph like every other city with a large lead solder install base, but they’ve been dragging their feet for literally decades while the people they serve get lead exposure. 1: https://www.opb.org/article/2021/11/30/lead-portland-oregon-...

You mean the anti-fluoridation fanatics didn't know when to get off the train? (channeling Richard Pryor here)

Re: Lead exposure in last century shrunk IQ scores of half of Americans: study

#163

Post by MathCodeLove »

survirtual wrote: post #142
WhompingWindows wrote: post #103

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Marijuana needs to be reclassified off of Schedule I Status in the USA, so it can be more thoroughly studied. Schedule I category shouldn't include recreational drugs like marijuana, which has no overdose possibility and has limited withdrawal side-effects. This wrong classification, going back to ignorant viewpoints of the early-mid 1900's, has heavily limited our scientific understanding of marijuana's effects on h…

This much is clear. Scheduling MJ is extremely unwise. But I would also extend this to everything in the psychedelic / hallucinogenic category. They do no psychological harm and an increasing body of evidence indicates that they, in all likelihood, do a significant amount of mental good for responsible users. An acute example of this is a psychedelic called “DMT”. This psychedelic is nearly everywhere in nature, incl…

Saying they do no psychological harm is quite am extreme statement and is just blatantly untrue. I tend to agree that these drugs should be dicriminalized, but you're doing the exact same thing thats been done with marijuana where the benefits of the drug are praised while the negatives are ignored.

Re: Lead exposure in last century shrunk IQ scores of half of Americans: study

#164

Post by arcticbull »

survirtual wrote: post #142
WhompingWindows wrote: post #103

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Marijuana needs to be reclassified off of Schedule I Status in the USA, so it can be more thoroughly studied. Schedule I category shouldn't include recreational drugs like marijuana, which has no overdose possibility and has limited withdrawal side-effects. This wrong classification, going back to ignorant viewpoints of the early-mid 1900's, has heavily limited our scientific understanding of marijuana's effects on h…

This much is clear. Scheduling MJ is extremely unwise. But I would also extend this to everything in the psychedelic / hallucinogenic category. They do no psychological harm and an increasing body of evidence indicates that they, in all likelihood, do a significant amount of mental good for responsible users. An acute example of this is a psychedelic called “DMT”. This psychedelic is nearly everywhere in nature, incl…

> This is also in top of the fact that it discourages addicts from seeking real treatment due to fear of being criminalized.

Portugal decriminalized all drugs in 2000 and saw a huge reduction in harm associated with drug use, and did not see an increase in usage. They went from among the worst in the EU in terms of HIV infections to among the lowest. [1]

[1] https://www.theguardian.com/news/2017/dec/05/portugals-radic...

Re: Lead exposure in last century shrunk IQ scores of half of Americans: study

#165

Post by selimthegrim »

User23 wrote: post #67
softwarebeware wrote: post #10

It makes me angry to think of how wreckless the generations before millenials were. Lead's risks and damages were well-known long before 1996. And they still didn't ban it until then.

So is fluoride’s neurotoxicity[1], especially for developing brains, and we still insist on using it, to just give one example. We’re no less reckless than prior generations and our children will be just as baffled looking back at us as we are now. Yes I’m aware that idiots are also fixated on fluoridation. That doesn’t make the science wrong though. [1] https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC6923889/ Neurotoxi…

Do you have other citations? How is this different from fluoridated toothpaste or topical application at the dentist?

Re: Lead exposure in last century shrunk IQ scores of half of Americans: study

#166

Post by cma »

tomxor wrote: post #131
lhoff wrote: post #93

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I havent bought bread in probably 4 Years now. Investing half an hour of work (distributed over the day) every other week for a 2kg Bread. Half of it goes in the freezer. Also buying fresh vegtables and cooking instead of buying ready made dishes helps.

Yup, this is basically the only realistic way to avoid it, switch to types of food that cannot by their very nature have sugar added.

I would imagine most of those fresh vegetables have been domesticated/bred to increase sugars.

Re: Lead exposure in last century shrunk IQ scores of half of Americans: study

#168

Post by rubyn00bie »

legitster wrote: post #61

I have a strong worries that our current generation will have a similar huge reckoning with marijuana. We are already seeing studies that show regular marijuana use is correlated with permanent decreases in intelligence, memory loss, motivation, and mental health. And anecdotally, this seems very apparent in my peer group. And Americans are using copious amounts of the stuff right now, and younger than ever before. I…

You’re really not telling the story correctly based on evidence you linked below, to quote:

> Fig. 3 shows that, among adolescent-onset persistentcannabis users, within-person IQ decline was apparent regardlessof whether cannabis was used infrequently (median use = 14 d)or frequently (median use = 365 d) in the year before testing. Incontrast, within-person IQ decline was not apparent amongadult-onset persistent cannabis users who used cannabis in-frequently (median use = 6 d) or frequently (median use = 365 d)in the year before testing.

So more specifically smoking weed while your brain is developing seems to be correlated to a decline in IQ later in life. While those who start smoking, even copious amounts, as adults don’t have a permanent decline.

I am cannot find reference to support your claim that people are consuming it younger than before.

If you’re going to cite studies, you could at least represent the findings honestly. Also, it’s pretty apparent you’re trying to sell a narrative to others to induce fear of marijuana… this is a post about lead poisoning after all. Quite the leap, IMHO, to compare it marijuana use…

The paper you linked below and incorrectly summarized for anyone curious: https://www.pnas.org/doi/abs/10.1073/pnas.1206820109

Re: Lead exposure in last century shrunk IQ scores of half of Americans: study

#169

Post by mark-r »

scythe wrote: post #105
legitster wrote: post #61

I have a strong worries that our current generation will have a similar huge reckoning with marijuana. We are already seeing studies that show regular marijuana use is correlated with permanent decreases in intelligence, memory loss, motivation, and mental health. And anecdotally, this seems very apparent in my peer group. And Americans are using copious amounts of the stuff right now, and younger than ever before. I…

Kids aren't smoking weed when they're eight. Or four, for that matter.

Second-hand smoke?
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