
Some US Troops Are Slowly Being Poisoned by Lead in Their Bones - gscott
https://www.military.com/military-report/these-us-troops-are-slowly-being-poisoned-lead-their-bones.html?ESRC=mr_190408.nl
======
giardini
This alarmist headline misleadingly implies _all_ US troops are being poisoned
whereas in fact the article title was

 _" These US Troops Are Slowly Being Poisoned by Lead in Their Bones"_.

Furthermore, from the original article at

[https://www.nytimes.com/2019/04/03/magazine/lead-
poisoning-m...](https://www.nytimes.com/2019/04/03/magazine/lead-poisoning-
military-soldiers.html)

"38 service members from 2012 to today [were] tested at Mount Sinai for
chronic lead poisoning. Of those, a dozen have measured bone lead levels
higher than what is considered normal, including four with almost twice the
expected amount."

So 12 soldiers, hardly an epidemic. And who knows the cause. Perhaps most of
the soldiers are reloaders who have cast their own bullets at home for years.
Maybe they mold fishing weights or make lead toy soldiers. IOW this is
something small, although important to those affected, which merits two
investigations:

\- one of their backgrounds and sources of exposure and

\- perhaps a random sample test of the infantry population.

~~~
crooked-v
12 out of all soldiers may not be a lot, but 12 out of 38 certainly is.

~~~
giardini
crooked-v says: _" 12 out of all soldiers may not be a lot, but 12 out of 38
certainly is."_

If the 38 were a random sample then finding that 12 of the 38 had high lead
levels would indeed be alarming and call for further study. But it appears
those were persons already suspected of having problems. In contrast the
article at

[https://www.nytimes.com/2019/04/03/magazine/lead-
poisoning-m...](https://www.nytimes.com/2019/04/03/magazine/lead-poisoning-
military-soldiers.html)

reveals:

" _The Department of Defense, which until last year annually tested blood lead
levels in just 1,200 out of almost three million troops and civilian
employees, has found very few cases of lead poisoning, leading Army officials
to believe that there isn’t a widespread problem._ "

