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Junkfood Science comments on Jeremy Piven's claim that he is suffering from mercury poisoning

http://junkfoodscience.blogspot.com/200 ... h-fly.html

This is weird and a little scary, since it seems that maybe half, or more, of bloggers and posters accept the Piven story, well, as given. Especially troubling because the context clearly suggests that an excuse on the order of "The dog ate my homework", or "I thought it was just a vitamin injection" , or "I want to spend more time with my family" is being played.

ABC news called Jeff a few days ago to ask his opinion about the matter.

He didn't think that the mercury levels were at a particularly high level for somebody who eats a lot of seafood.

PlacentiaSoccerMom wrote:ABC news called Jeff a few days ago to ask his opinion about the matter.

He didn't think that the mercury levels were at a particularly high level for somebody who eats a lot of seafood.

This is true, but just to make things perfectly clear:

Not only is it fairly common for a person's mercury level to be 5-6 times the upper limit of normal [which is what I have read regarding Mr. Piven] if you eat a lot of fish, but such an elevation is also not anywhere near dangerous.

I see patients referred to me for such meager elevations pretty routinely, and none have any detectable medical illness. The problem is that the reported "normal range" of mercury levels is very, very low, and was determined from people who haven't had any known exposures. A clinical laboratory may report a normal blood mercury level as, say, <5 micrograms per liter. But this does not mean that a level of 10 micrograms/liter means that you are sick. There are some lab tests where being just a little bit outside of the normal range can indicate a high likelihood of illness; but the heavy metal tests are not among these. It usually takes levels many dozens or hundreds of time the upper limit of normal to be a marker of illness. Similarly, people can be tested for the presence of all sorts of chemicals in their bodies (for example, polychlorinated biphenyls [PCBs], dioxin, DDT, etc.) and you will be likely to find one or several of these to be elevated if you test for enough of them. It is a testament to our analytical powers that we can find trace amounts of these toxins in our bodies, not evidence that the world has (yet) become dangerously polluted.

jsuchard wrote:

PlacentiaSoccerMom wrote:ABC news called Jeff a few days ago to ask his opinion about the matter.

He didn't think that the mercury levels were at a particularly high level for somebody who eats a lot of seafood.

This is true, but just to make things perfectly clear:

Not only is it fairly common for a person's mercury level to be 5-6 times the upper limit of normal [which is what I have read regarding Mr. Piven] if you eat a lot of fish, but such an elevation is also not anywhere near dangerous.

I see patients referred to me for such meager elevations pretty routinely, and none have any detectable medical illness. The problem is that the reported "normal range" of mercury levels is very, very low, and was determined from people who haven't had any known exposures. A clinical laboratory may report a normal blood mercury level as, say, <5 micrograms per liter. But this does not mean that a level of 10 micrograms/liter means that you are sick. There are some lab tests where being just a little bit outside of the normal range can indicate a high likelihood of illness; but the heavy metal tests are not among these. It usually takes levels many dozens or hundreds of time the upper limit of normal to be a marker of illness. Similarly, people can be tested for the presence of all sorts of chemicals in their bodies (for example, polychlorinated biphenyls [PCBs], dioxin, DDT, etc.) and you will be likely to find one or several of these to be elevated if you test for enough of them. It is a testament to our analytical powers that we can find trace amounts of these toxins in our bodies, not evidence that the world has (yet) become dangerously polluted.

What's the LD50 for mercury?

A couple of college students did a study of one of the local lakes back in the 70s -- couldn't find much. It's worse now at a different smaller lake. Everyone's still eating the fish, though.

I've had this song running though my head since hearing about John Cusack's good friend:

Mercury Poisoning
(Graham Parker)

No more pretending now,
The albatross is dying in its nest
The company is crippling me,
the worst trying to ruin the best, the best

Their promotion's so lame
They could never ever take it to the real ball game
Maybe they think I'm a pet
Well I've got all the diseases
I'm breaking out in sweat, you bet, because

I got, Mercury poisoning
It's fatal and it don't get better
I got, Mercury poisoning
The best kept secret in the west, hey the west

The boys and me are getting real well known around town
But every time we try to spread the action
Someone always brings it down, down
I ate the orange and I don't feel well
For them it's inconvenience for me it's hell
The geriatric staff think we're freaks
They couldn't sell kebabs to the Greeks, the geeks
Inaction speaks, and

I got, Mercury poisoning
It's fatal and it don't get better
I got, Mercury poisoning
The best kept secret in the west, hey the west

Is this a Russian conspiracy, no it's just idiocy
Is this a Chinese burn
I gotta dinosaur for a representative
It's got a small brain and refuses to learn

Their promotion's so lame
They could never ever take it to the real ball game
Listen I ain't a pet
I aint a token hipster, in your monopoly set
You bet because

I got, Mercury poisoning
It's fatal and it don't get better
I got, Mercury poisoning
The best kept secret in the west, hey the west

Yeah the best kept secret in the west
The best kept secret in the west


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Or maybe it's Jeremy's new hair that's giving him problems.

Mr. Piven, I'm available for a consult.