Comments on: Lead Poisoning Is A Total Fallacy

By: Words for our enjoyment. « Welcome to the 505

Words for our enjoyment. « Welcome to the 505 — Mon, 14 Apr 2008 16:01:16 +0000

[...] of the results Google came up with was Mr. Davidson’s post called “Lead Poisoning Is A Total Fallacy“. This post totally debunks the myth that lead poisoning can kill you. Except lead pencils [...]

By: Bored Alot

Bored Alot — Wed, 23 May 2007 16:44:33 +0000

I feel the need to slap each and everyone of you who ever thought that pencils ever had lead in them. And that you could die from it.
I mean, don’t you READ? It’s goddamn common knowledge.
And this blog… It’s so insane that I can’t really tell if you’re joking or if you’re being serious. No one can be this retarded.

By: Julie

Julie — Wed, 28 Feb 2007 07:13:30 +0000

I just had a piece of pencil lead (ie. graphite, carbon) removed from my left thumb yesterday. Then I started looking up info on pencil lead poisoning and found this website.
I am 48 years old, this piece of writing utensil has been embedded in my thumb for at least 42 years. I don’t really even remember the incident I just know that it involved a pencil breaking off in my thumb. I never even told my parents about it until I was an adult and it started to bother me.
It would surface occasionally and seemed to be getting bigger. Then several months ago it started to surface and itch. So, I decided it was time to have it removed. The Doc was amazed at how long it had been there but assured me that lead poisoning was not an issue. As the Doc was cutting it out she said that she couldn’t believe how big it was. It had developed a cyst next to and around it. The piece was about 1/4th inch long and 1/8th inch deep. There was also a lot of discoloration around the area that she removed.
I probably would not have had it removed except that it was beginning to hurt and itch. It was kinda funny but during the extraction I started feeling sad because I was having a piece of me removed. But that went away quickly.
So, I am a testiment to the fact that you don’t die by the age of 30 from pencil “lead” poisoning.

By: tanisha

tanisha — Sat, 06 Jan 2007 17:42:23 +0000

im so happy i found your site because im a pencil eater and all my friends are telling me that i am going to die of lead poisoning, now i know its graphite which isn’t poisonous. so can you reply back and tell me if im in any danger later on in my life, i am only fourteen, so if i will be in trouble i need to know so i can stop. thanks alot. tanisha jones.

By: Dahlia

Dahlia — Sat, 23 Dec 2006 18:20:07 +0000

Wow…u have my sympathy james cooper! im so glad I googled my pencil episode…..who knew! it turns out accidental pencil stabbing (APS) is Pretty damn common. btw just made that acronym up =)
My APS episode happened in 1989, where I accidently stabbed my left palm with my pencil in a mad rage. I cant remember if I bled at all…and I tried to push it out at the time, but that was no help. I dont think I ever want it removed…I mean if its not doing any harm, why should I? Its been a part of me since childhood. Good new is: Im still Alive people! 25 goin on 26.

By: Zarzy

Zarzy — Mon, 27 Nov 2006 10:41:21 +0000

Thank goodness i found your site! After being stabbed with a pencil about 10 years ago at school and being left with this attractive bit of pencil in my thumb , ive worried ever since from people telling me i’d get lead poisoning. Now i can stop worrying and stop picking at it in the hope id get it out. Yay!!

By: cari

cari — Wed, 18 Oct 2006 14:23:24 +0000

come on, its not lead. its graphite.

By: brenda d

brenda d — Wed, 27 Sep 2006 17:06:27 +0000

okay, iget what you are saying. but what about pencils back in the sixties. did they have enough lead in them to hurt you? i understand that lead poisoning can take a long time to show symptoms. i jammed a pencil in my leg (accidently) back in elem. school and now have all these symptoms that can indicate lead poisoning. What do you think?

By: susan

susan — Mon, 25 Sep 2006 20:22:17 +0000

To James Cooper: Eyew. Poor you. Ouch. My problems seem so minor now - thanks for sharing!

By: James Cooper

James Cooper — Mon, 25 Sep 2006 16:33:23 +0000

Story time!

When I was very young, around the fourth grade it was, I often wound up letting my mind wander as I sat at my desk “doing my homework.”

One night, as I sat there eyes glazed over, my no. 2 pencil began rolling off my desk. In my not-entirely-there state I reached for the pencil just before it reached the end of the desk and just then my chair tipped over.

I fell with my chair, pencil loosely gripped in my hand, and as I hit the ground my bent elbow made contact and caused my grip to tighten and my hand to move towards my face. The end result — the tip of the pencil had punctured my right eyeball.

I hadn’t realized that at first though and I explained to my parents what had happened and that my eye felt irritated. Little did I know I was leaking eyeball fluids and the damned thing was actually slowly deflating. It wasn’t until later that my parents gave in to my persistent whining and took me in to see the eye doctor.

He took a quick look and quickly had me admitted to the hospital. There my eye was patched up and healed over the next few months.

The amusing end result, however, was that the puncture was just outside of my visual cortex leaving my vision, poor as it already was, intact, and furthermore puncturing my eyeball actually cured me of my astigmatism. So, now I have one egg-shaped eyeball and the other is perfectly round.

Oh, and I still have a little bit of graphite dust floating around in there which I see if I focus on it and move my eyes about so it swirls in the fluid.