I was curious if my brass 1920s Gillette open comb safety razor had lead in it. @oilyfish suggested just getting some lead test swabs and finding out for myself. So I did. Sadly, its brass does have lead. The exposure is probably pretty low but if you've got a pre WWII Gillette, it's something to keep in mind. #vintage #shaving #razor #SafteyRazor

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@LazaroDTormes @IPXFong @oilyfish risks of lead poisoning are associated with chronical oral or respiratory exposure (in tap water, in dust). lead has proven harmful effects at a certain blood concentration (>5-20 ug/dL in children, higher concentration for neurological effects) see doi.org/10.1016%2Fj.cpem.2017. as reference. reaching such an intoxicating level in adults is not easy, except if you are working in lead industry. lead skin absorption is very limited, you need to apply highly concentrated lead over the skin of rats chronically for 12 days before being able to detect any in their urine, see also pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/350519 . moreover, lead decontamination can be achieved by simple soap washing, and treatments done with EDTA chelation (which is present in certain soaps, balms and cosmetics) which scavenge inorganic lead. your brass razor might contain trace lead, but is not falling in dust, and its contact over your skin is brief and in presence of soap. contamination risks are very low, except if you suck it all day long 😊

@certainlytwice @IPXFong @oilyfish Thank you for your thorough response! I have used those old razors, so I was curious.

@LazaroDTormes
I think the risk is super low but I'll probably retire my Gillette anyway. I'm sure it's not the only source of lead in my day to day environment and it's a way to cut down my total exposure. But, mostly I'm going to retire it because I have a modern all steel Feather razor that, while not as cool, does give a better shave. 😁

@certainlytwice @oilyfish

@IPXFong @LazaroDTormes @oilyfish that is a fine reason indeed 😋 and you are perfectly right the metal intoxications are associated with their accumulation in the body (eg. Aluminium). so it is never bad to minimize exposures anyway.

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