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Permalink Reply by John Wolff on May 4, 2011 at 1:30am

I've seen video of Laysan albatrosses on Midway Island dying in convulsions beside the WWII era military buildings after eating paint flakes there (I believe they've since been cleaned-up and demolished).
I'd call a 1x2" lead paint chip "huge". Fine dust might be even worse (more likely to be ingested).

So do some research to find out how best to minimize the hazard.

You can get lead paint test kits at hardware stores. I've tried these, but as I recall, the results were "inconclusive".

I don't know the chemistry, but possible memory fragment: lead is insoluble in either acidic or basic solutions maybe? So you choose cleaning solutions in which lead is insoluble, to avoid spreading it around? Like, if lead is insoluble in acid, clean the floor with vinegar? I'm guessing, I may have this wrong!!
Use a GOOD particle mask whenever you work with such stuff. I'd think you want to avoid sanding lead paint or anything that'll make dust. I'd think if you flake or scrape off paint chips and vacuum throughly, you're dealing with relatively huge particles (not dust) that's not gonna float deep into your lungs or get past a good mask and are easily vacuumed up.
You do NOT want to strip lead paint with heat; I believe that volatilizes it and you can get enough exposure to produce obvious symptoms. Let the pros do that.

Bottom line: I would NOT want my dog ingesting paint chips, flakes, motes, or dust. Keep the place clean. A puppy or child is much more vulnerable than an adult.

Even new houses might have lead paint; I smelled idiot renters next door painting with old, presumably scavenged alkyd paint many, many years after latex had replaced alkyd. I just remembered this; gotta warn my neighbor who has 2 young boys in there!

Interesting book review(?) in Science years back: In Europe, when the dangers of lead paint became known, the response was (duh) to quit lead paint. Here, it was an ad campaign (Dutch Boy, all those nice colors in the beautiful artwork) to make us feel good about paint and the nice companies that sell it to us. Lead elimination was delayed for decades. Lead is very toxic and the people who marketed it long after the hazards were well-known are criminals.

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Permalink Reply by Rachael & Waffle on May 4, 2011 at 11:05am

Lead, and other metals (heavy or not), are soluble in acid-- even weak acids like vinegar. Simply scrubbing the paint isn't going to remove any significant amount of lead, since the solid particles in the paint are mostly lead complexes. The only way to get rid of the lead in lead-based paint is to get rid of all of the paint.

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Permalink Reply by Emily & Scout on May 4, 2011 at 9:21am

You could get a simple blood lead test for Winston that should be fairly inexpensive.  He most likely will have a little lead exposure, but the vet will be able to tell you if it is elevated enough to do any damage. 

 

Lead IS insoluble in acidic solutions.  I worked at a battery factory and did tests for lead in the battery plates using acid. When I was at the factory, we had to get tested for lead every 2 months.  Not a big deal.

 

 

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Permalink Reply by Jane on May 4, 2011 at 10:51am

I would call your landlord, he should be responsible for fixing it I would think. What if there were small children in the house? There's a big difference between signing something saying you are aware that there is lead paint in the apartment, and having pieces of it falling from the ceiling. I would assume he is responsible for keeping the apartment safe, and as other posters said the dust can be harmful as well.

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