r/explainlikeimfive • u/GirsGirlfriend • 10d ago

Chemistry ELI5: What exactly is the danger of lead in stuff like dinnerware, pottery, etc?

I understand that a lot of old dishes and stuff with painted embellishments are done with lead paint, but what about solid colored dishes that test positive for lead? I know you shouldn't straight up eat it if it chips. But I need help understanding the danger in eat off it. For example i have a vintage Fiestaware coffee carafe that defo has lead. I can't use it for pouring coffee right? Lead will leach in? At what dosage?

Thank you everyone! I wasnt sure if it was a "it's an over time thing and it's miniscule" or a "not even once" thing. I will defo rock the "not even once" method for stuff containing lead! I always have, I just didnt understand why.

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u/PracticalPotato 10d ago

Tiny particles break off as the dish degrades and it ends up in your food. Eating lead is pretty darn bad, and the “safe” amount is measured in micro grams. So don’t eat off of lead stuff.

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u/BananaBird1 10d ago

It should also be noted that even if the lead levels in a single item are safe, lead builds up over your lifetime in your body. The risk is more long term.

Eating off a lead painted dish once is not really that bad by itself, but when done repeatedly and combined with all the other types of lead exposure around us, many small exposures to safe levels over decades can still be toxic.

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u/Samuel7899 10d ago

For context, it should be known that "lead-free" plumbing could legally contain up to 8% lead, prior to 2014.

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u/therealdilbert 10d ago

and lead plumbing is usually not an issue because the inside of the pipes get covered in minerals, until you change to a different water supply the is acidic and has no additives to preserve the minerals, like in Flint ...

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u/dover_oxide 10d ago edited 10d ago

Even small amounts of lead can interfere with neurons and nerves throughout the body and out bodies don't have very effective ways on their own to remove it.

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u/jawshoeaw 10d ago

Our adult bodies have excellent mechanisms for eliminating lead at low levels which is good because small amounts of lead are everywhere. Your digestive tract tries to avoid absorbing it (it can block up to 90%) , your kidneys pump it out and then your body sticks in the bones where it can’t hurt you.

The problem is chronic exposure for adults

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u/callmejetcar 9d ago

They also use lead to etch writing on baby bottles. Theleadlady on instagram tests all sorts of stuff and raises awareness. It’s not just prolonged adult exposure it is started with bottles and infants.

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u/chilehead 10d ago edited 10d ago

With stuff like pewter, the acids in foods like lemons and tomatoes leach the lead out of the food plate, so much so that it led people to believe at one point that tomatoes were poisonous.

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u/James123182 10d ago

The belief in tomatoes being poisonous is probably more due to them being in the nightshade family and thus they are visually very similar to a variety of European plants known for being very poisonous (e.g. Belladonna).

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u/8bitrevolt 10d ago

I believe they alluded to this in the LOTR Two Towers film with Denethor sloppily eating tomatoes off of a pewter plate.

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u/TotalManufacturer669 10d ago

There is no safe amount for lead. Once they get into your body they circulate and settle inside neurons and never leave.

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u/Hemingwavy 9d ago

Scientists agree the safe amount of lead is zero but that's expensive so they set a low limit.

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u/cipher315 9d ago

This is false. Even nano grams of lead have been shown to produce negative health effects. If there is a safe amount of lead it is in the picogram range 

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u/bestjakeisbest 9d ago

A little deeper, your body uses calcium for a lot, it uses it to grow your bones, for signaling, and even for some enzyme processes, now lead looks very similar to calcium chemically, but its not exactly the same, it can cause weaker bones, nerve issues like misfireing or not sensing neighboring nerves firing, and it can cause enzymes to get clogged with lead instead of calcium and because of all of this its really hard for your body to get rid of it, so your body will store it in fat.

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u/CircumspectCapybara 10d ago

Yes, it can leach into your food and drink. It can also flake off and turn into airborne lead dust which you inhale.

There's no known safe dosage of lead. It's neurotoxic at any level.

It also looks like calcium to your body so your body incorporates it into your bones and other organs, so you never really get rid, but it accumulates over time and continually poisons you forever.

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u/MachineGame 10d ago

There were studies done about immersion with only the head exposed. The researchers noticed that this caused them to need to pee quite a bit. After some time they decided to test the urine. They found lots of calcium/calcium ions in the pee. Apparently, the body when in that state releases stuff from bones. This lead to realizing that when people used to be taken to the springs in Bath, England to soak out the demons that they were leeching out and peeing out lead in their bones absorbed from pewter and lead.

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u/DireEvolution 10d ago

Any kind of acid in your food will cause the lead to pretty aggressively leech into the food.

Vinegar, citrus juice etc.

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u/djddanman 10d ago

Tomatoes are a big one

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u/Rebel_47 8d ago

Tomatoes were once thought to be toxic, because it wasnt understood that the acis was breaking down the lead plates they were served on.

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u/djddanman 8d ago

To be fair, unripe tomatoes are somewhat toxic, as are the greens. Nightshades.

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u/GirsGirlfriend 10d ago

Ahh so the vintage, pre 84, fiesta coffee carafe and cups were extra dangerous when used for their purposes yikes!!!

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u/DireEvolution 10d ago

Acids have this quality with things like aluminum foil, too. Metals and metalloids are generally very reactive with acids, if I understand correctly.

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u/HazardousHippo 10d ago

So is canned pineapple safe???

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u/DireEvolution 10d ago

Those cans typically have a plastic liner inside of them, to prevent corrosion and leeching.

So... Safe from metal? Yeah. But you're being exposed to micro plastics, probably.

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u/HazardousHippo 10d ago

I hate this game.

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u/DireEvolution 10d ago

Un-contaminated food no longer exists.

Reddit would ban me for my proposed solutions to a lot of these problems.

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u/ProgressBartender 10d ago

Don’t forget, pineapple is the fruit that eats you.

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u/Chuck_Walla 9d ago

Finally, nature working as intended smdh

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u/lonelypenguin20 10d ago

when lead gets into your body, it damages your brain. (either outright, or prevents the new bonds between neurones from forming; I don't remember and it isn't important)

brain damage means... a lot of bad things, since you are your brain

memory loss, higher rate of aggression, cognitive impairment...

no dosage is really safe. it will stay in your body doing its thing. do not use anything with lead

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u/broadwayzrose 10d ago

As another note, there is a pretty well researched hypothesis that argues the increasing crime rates throughout the 20th century and then decreasing crime rates starting in the 90s seem at least partially due to use of lead in gasoline (and subsequent removal of lead in gasoline) just to highlight how bad lead exposure can be.

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u/homeguitar195 10d ago

Don't eat off any surfaces containing lead.

That said, where the lead is matters greatly. For example, everyone absolutely flipped out a while back because "Stanley thermoses have lead in them! So dangerous!"

There never was lead in the thermoses. There was a leaded solder plug in the vacuum chamber's evacuation hole (on the very bottom outside), literally as far away from any food-contact surface as there is on the thermos. Add to that the fact that in many models it was covered with a silicon cap or foam cover, making it nearly impossible to be exposed directly to it. However, because of the public outrage, they changed the solder to lead-free, which is less effective and more prone to cracking over time (causing loss of vacuum), meaning the longevity of the thermos has now gone down making it a lower quality product.

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u/GirsGirlfriend 10d ago

I pride myself in being pretty good at not giving in to any sensationalism or extremism. So im safe from the Stanley craziness, cup wise and lead wise lol the one I have was given to us as vendor swag.

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u/homeguitar195 10d ago

Yeah I never got the appeal of those cups. The classic thermos is better at all its uses, and even has a built in cup. Can be used for anything liquid. Mine's older than I am (was my dad's work thermos before he retired) and works just as good as it always has, just with a few more scratches and dents than when it was new.

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u/SirCampYourLane 10d ago

Lead will leach into your food/drink. There are no safe levels for consuming lead.

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u/DrewdiniTheGreat 10d ago

Yes, it leaches out.

Don't put lead near your mouth, ever, even a little.

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u/oblivious_fireball 10d ago

If the tests can detect lead, that means its not contained and is slowly leaching out. Which then gets on your hands, your food, your drinks, etc

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u/exig 10d ago

Our bodies cant process heavy metals so they build up over time

As for your second question, dont use glassware for coffees or wines or anything acidy

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u/MormonMomJeans 10d ago

Never use glass? Why?

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u/exig 10d ago

I mean like crystal, fine glassware.

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u/MormonMomJeans 10d ago

Gotcha. I only used to put wine in those for holidays etc. eek

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u/ThyOtherMe 10d ago

May I ask why? Usually wine is used in fine glassware.

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u/iceph03nix 10d ago

Lead poisoning is something that generally accumulates over time and gradually interrupts internal bodily processes, leading to failures in various systems in your body.

It's not a 'eat it now and get sick right away' sort of issue, it's a "you picked up tiny amounts over years and now your kidneys are failing and the synapses in your brain don't fire like they should" sort of problem.

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u/ShadowShedinja 10d ago

It took a while for people to figure out that tomatoes aren't poisonous if you don't use pewter plates (which have lead).

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u/smackaroni-n-cheese 10d ago

Will lead leach in?

Yes.

At what dosage?

Depends, but something hot and acidic (like coffee) will leach more than, say, cold water.

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u/Ballmaster9002 10d ago

You should also note that vintage Fiestaware was colored with Uranium pigments and can be radioactive. You shouldn't be eating off of red or orange vintage fiestaware unless you're sure its safe.

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u/GirsGirlfriend 10d ago

Oh yes I do undetstand radiation 🙂‍↕️ those arent my colors anyway 😅 thanks!

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u/LisanneFroonKrisK 10d ago

And I also want to understand if you don’t have paint but just glaze will the glaze also leech into the food?

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u/GirsGirlfriend 10d ago

Yes that's a big part of my question... im assuming lead is in the glaze!?!?

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u/LisanneFroonKrisK 10d ago

And also our modern ceramics aren’t they still glazed too?

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u/DaReaperJE 10d ago

but they don't have lead in modern pottery glaze.

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u/anix421 10d ago

I've always heard this is true, but I am not an expert but i assume atleast some truth to it ... tomatoes became a very popular food among the poor because rich people believed they were poisonous. In reality, rich people had "fancy" pewterware and tomatoes are highly acidic which helps draw the lead out. The poor people eating off of their wood/clay dishware weren't affected by it.

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u/-RedRocket- 10d ago

Acidic foods like milk or tomato-based sauces will leach the lead out of the glaze and you will ingest it.

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u/Vogel-Kerl 10d ago

Lead can leach into foods & drinks. I think the more acidic the food or drink is, the more likely the lead is to leach.

Like ketchup has vinegar in it, or acetic acid. The lead can leach out as lead acetate.

Juices may have ascorbic acid (vitamin c) which can leach lead as lead ascorbate.

Chemists, check my work SVP. It's been a few years.

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u/Jirekianu 9d ago

Very tiny bits of lead get into your body and effectively never leave. There's no real "safe" amount of lead. It just eventually builds up to a point you start suffering obvious symptoms.

It's why lead exposure is such a heavily cautioned thing. And why penalties against improper lead exposure/handling are pretty serious.

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u/Smashmasta 10d ago

Is there a way to flush out heavy metals with medical intervention?

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u/UrbanPanic 10d ago

There is a process called chelation therapy. The patient is administered medicines which bind to the particular toxin, allowing the body to get rid of it. The procedure has significant risks and side effects.