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the ?"Well, that's their opinion," says Larry Keanedid this guy really pull a Lebowski when asked if high lead is unsafe?
Whoopsies. Gubmint can't tell me not to use lead in bullets.
Lead Dust From Firearms Can Pose A Silent Health Risk
http://www.npr.org/sections/health-s...nt-health-riskFirearms safety is key for people who use weapons at work or for recreational shooting. But one risk has been little acknowledged: Lead dust exposure.
In a standard bullet, a solid lead core wrapped in a copper jacket sits atop a stack of gunpowder and lead primer. When the gun fires, the primer ignites, the gunpowder lights, and some of the lead on the bullet boils. When the casing snaps out of the ejection port, lead particles trail behind it. As the bullet hurtles down the barrel of the gun, a shower of lead particles follows.
If a gun range isn't ventilated well, lead dust collects on shooters' clothing and hands and lingers in the air, where it can be inhaled. The more people shoot, the greater the risk of being exposed to dangerous amounts of lead. It becomes an occupational hazard for weapons instructors, police and defense personnel.
It can also put family members at risk. A 1-year-old boy in Connecticut was found to have high blood lead levels at a routine doctor's visit. There were no lead paint or pipes in the child's home. The exposure was traced to his father's job as a maintenance worker at an indoor shooting range; the father cared for his son after work in lead-contaminated clothing, according to a 2015 report from the state public health department.
In order to reduce risk, the Department of Defense has lowered its blood lead standard to 20 micrograms of lead per deciliter of blood, three times more restrictive than its previous standard, which relied on Occupational Safety and Health Administration guidelines. These OSHA guidelines apply to workers inside the United States, including employees of private firing ranges, but not to customers of those ranges.
The DoD's new blood lead policy, in effect as of April, comes after a National Academy of Sciences report published in 2012 showing that defense personnel face significant health risks from lead from firing ranges, defense department spokesperson Lieutenant Colonel James Brindle told NPR. "DoD's subject matter experts in toxicology and occupational medicine used the Committee's report to propose the lower allowable blood lead level." The study also showed that people should expect negative health consequences at the blood lead standard set by OSHA.
The OSHA standards for blood lead and exposure to lead have long been criticized as inadequate and dangerously outdated. "The current [Occupational Safety and Health Administration] standard hasn't been updated since the 1970s," says Dr. Elena Page, an occupational and environmental hazards physician at the National Ins ute for Occupational Safety and Health. "It's widely acknowledged that the OSHA standard is not protective. They're clearly aware of that, and there's been a lot of pressure to change it." OSHA did not provide comments or interviews requested for this story.
About 1 million law enforcement officers train on indoor ranges, according to the CDC, and there are 16,000 to 18,000 private indoor ranges in the U.S.
Currently, the OSHA standards for lead exposure decree that employees must stop working if they have a blood lead level of 60 micrograms of lead per deciliter of blood, and workers can return to the job if their blood lead level drops below 40 for two consecutive tests. But adverse effects on cardiovascular health, brain function and kidney function have been connected to blood lead levels as low as 5. "There's no amount of lead in your blood that's safe," Page says.
The issue of lead exposure and firearms is divisive, even the question of whether higher lead levels are unsafe. "Well, that's their opinion," says Larry Keane, the vice president and general counsel for the National Shooting Sports Foundation. "We believe there are efforts by others that want to diminish people's participation in shooting sports or exercise their second amendment rights. They put out or advocate positions that are unsupported by the evidence."
Never seen any NRA advisory ever on anything to do with this.
This kind of lead has some very lasting harm.
I find it funny that any attempt to even have mild evidence-based policies are met with some fanatical stupidity.
the ?"Well, that's their opinion," says Larry Keane
I only shoot outdoors so never really thought about the harms of lead dust. Easy fix=require better ventilation.
also making their kids deader, so generally it evens out
The obvious solution to fixing the problem is banning violent video games
...and put little black stickers on the CD's with naughty words. Make sure they ban those CD's at China-Mart as well.
Along with allowing prayer in school tbh
And also to increase mental health treatment, except that millions of people are on the verge of losing health insurance, WHOOPSIE DAISIE!
While cooking eggs on an asbestos skilletthe ?
problem with that is that you are still introducing lead into the environment.
Better to simply make the shot out of something a bit less toxic, especially if you are a hunter or fisherman intent on actually eating something.
Look up the concept of biomagnification.
I've already made the switch to non-lead while hunting in CA as I believe it's fully banned by 2019. For target practice and plinking it's just not practical to use non-lead because of the huge price increase.
Would you use lead hunting if it wasn't banned?
Would depend on the type of hunting but 95% of the time I'd use non lead anyways. If I'm eradicating gophers, squirrel, coyotes I'd use lead.
Biomagnification. Lead in what you shot from the one bullet wouldn't do much, but all the lead it has ingested over its lifetime would matter more.
Introducing extra lead into the environment generally is a bad idea. It takes very little to have significant effects.
Meh, I hunt with anium anyhow.. thwack!
now big gubmint coming in telling me how to shoot
https://www.thedodo.com/bald-eagle-a...306402071.htmlBald Eagles Keep Dying And No One's Talking About It
"They cannot even open their beaks."
When a bald eagle was brought to a wildlife rehabilitation center late last month, he was paralyzed and couldn't even hold his head up.
People had to carry the motionless bird. His head rested on his wing. Rescuers rushed to cleanse his blood of the poison that was slowly strangling the life out of him.
This happens to bald eagles all the time. And Lynn Tompkins, executive director of Blue Mountain Wildlife Rehabilitation and Education Center in Oregon, has been trying to save them for 30 years.
"His head was upside down when we got him," Tompkins told The Dodo. "Lead affectsthe nerves, so that's your brain, your use of muscles, all parts of the body. The birds often cannot stand ... They usually have difficulty breathing. They cannot even open their beaks."
The lead gets into the bodies of bald eagles - as well as owls and other kinds of raptors - after they've eaten dead animals shot by hunters who use lead bullets. "Raptors are quite willing to be scavengers, so they scavenge," she said. "They eat things that have been shot. Lead ammunition is the biggest source."
U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service (USFWS) researchers examining 58 dead bald eagles in 2012. Sixty percent had detectable concentrations of lead; 38 percent had lethal lead concentrations. Birds with more severe poisoning who manage to survive take months to treat and fully rehabilitate. "We had one eagle whose lead level was relatively low, but she was paralyzed, she couldn't stand, she couldn't unclench her feet," Tomkins said. "It took several treatments to get the lead level down. It took several months for her to fly normally again. It took six months. That was a long time."
Even when bald eagles suffer from lower levels of lead exposure, their coordination and decision-making can be compromised. "This can put him in more dangerous positions, like scavenging along the road for roadkill and then he can be hit by a car," Tompkins explained.
As Tompkins' latest patient was struggling for his life, the U.S. Secretary of the Interior, Ryan Zinke, was overturning a ban on the use of lead ammunition in wildlife refuges.
A radiograph of a coyote carcass shows how far a bullet's lead can disperse. |Blue Mountain WildlifeThe ban aimed to help save animals, including the iconic American bald eagle, from dying slow deaths from lead. Zinke argued that the interests of hunters were not sufficiently represented in the ban.
Sadly, the latest bald eagle who came into the center never had a chance to fly freely again. After four days of treatments to clean the lead out of his bloodstream, the bird's body finally suc bed to the poison that had already reached his tissue. "This particular bird, every once in a while, he'd get startled and flap his wing out of fear, and then he'd stop," Tompkins remembered. "The treatment cannot reach the lead that's already gotten into other tissues."
Because lead poisoning is so prevalent, it's hard to even tally how many bald eagles and other raptors are impacted by it each year. Last year, Tompkins tested 160 birds, almost all raptors, for traces of lead. "We're finding it in more and more species," she said. "We started off with eagles but now we're also testing hawks, owls and other birds." Tompkins found that 80 percent of eagles, 30 percent of hawks and 25 percent of great horned owls had lead in their blood.
"So far this year we've had three bald eagles come into the center - all of them had toxic levels of lead," Tompkins said. "Lead is toxic. There's no argument about that."
To give bald eagles impacted by lead a chance to survive, you can contribute to the rescue center.
That's ed.
If they are going to allow hunting with lead on the preserves it should be required that the carcass be disposed of or buried to limit the amount of lead laying around.
US Parks and Wildlife SLAUGHTERS over 1M animals year. What's a few bald eagles? Hunter gotta hunt, and hunt with lead.
What's the limit on bald eagles these days?
on a roll today
i really like the teams here.
Speaking of gun nuts...
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