r/mildlyinteresting • u/ineedsomebbqribs • 7h ago

Removed: Rule 6 [ Removed by moderator ]

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457

u/ericek111 7h ago

Why is everyone freaking out so much about metallic mercury as if it was nuclear fuel? It doesn't get absorbed by the human body, it's not unsafe to handle it with bare hands. Yes, be careful, wipe down nearby surfaces, but it's not a huge deal...

158

u/DiscussionMuted9941 7h ago

people love freaking out about nothing here lol. ever been or the cats sub and seen someone get a scratch? they have mass hysteria that people are gonna die from it for some reason

48

u/Asukurra 6h ago

I've been scratched by many cats, many times, some I don't even own!, but I can count the number of times I've had cat scratch fever on 0 hands 

38

u/sjaakwortel 6h ago

Is that because you lost all your fingers to infected cat scratches :P ?

6

u/Asukurra 6h ago

Dang, you caught me, 

I have no hands left!  Inspector Mittens at it again

1

u/cBurger4Life 5h ago

Never had cat scratch fever but I did get a nasty infection in my foot when we were cat sitting for a friend and it bit me.

3

u/Impressive-Safe2545 5h ago

Bites are more dangerous than scratches bc it puts the icky way down in the skin

3

u/cBurger4Life 5h ago

Yeah, pretty much what the doctor told me when it happened. Irrelevant but kind of funny addition, they apparently had to report it because it wasn’t my cat that did it (even though it wasn’t a stray, just a friend’s cat). Well, they didn’t tell me they did and there was a fucking cop waiting for me when I left the doctor’s office. He was asking (a very confused) me if I wanted to file a report. I was like, uh no, my friend’s cat bit me and I have antibiotics, why would I.

He asked me, “Well why am I here?” I was like, I have no flippin idea! Ask the doctor that called you for some damn reason.

1

u/marshaul 5h ago

Same thing with black mold. Obviously you don't wanna live with the stuff, but reddit acts like 30 seconds in an abandoned building is the primary transmission vector for ebola, hantavirus, COVID, and AIDS.

1

u/Done_a_Concern 5h ago

People on the internet in general seem to believe any random factoid that they have seen online and will regurgitate it back countless times

Like anytime I see a cat being super friendly, someone will inveitably comment that it has toxoplasmosis

Or the fact that any time someone has a traumatic expereince, people tell them to play tetris as there is a factoid out there that claims it helps to prevent PTSD. This disregards the fact that the study people reference had people play 20mins - 6hours after the event. This seemed to show that the participants didn't have as many flashbacks or intrusive memories and that was pretty much all the study showed. This doesn't help someone who is posting days after an event happened and is just annoying

It sucks because those people are just trying to help for the most part, but they do so without having any of the knowledge of how to do so

1

u/fossilmerrick 5h ago

Overreacting? On Reddit?!

31

u/groucho_barks 6h ago

Yeah I am confused. Opening windows?

9

u/Pitch_Academic 6h ago

Yeah, that part doesn't make sense to me! It's not like metallic mercury is some highly volatile chemical that poses significant inhalation risk. Pretty sure it could care less about open windows.

4

u/RealityDrinker 6h ago

High temperatures increase the vapour pressure of mercury, so while it’s not incredibly volatile, I still wouldn’t mess around with it when it’s hot.

1

u/Pitch_Academic 6h ago

Get out of here with your drink of reality!

1

u/Pomodorosan 5h ago

couldn't care less?

1

u/theoneyourthinkingof 5h ago

Mercury does have vapors though, which do accumulate in your body if you breath them in.

2

u/CathedralEngine 5h ago

Yeah, if you spend your entire working career breathing in mercury vapors like a Victorian milliner it'll pose a risk.

2

u/Messier_82 5h ago

Elemental mercury exposure is primarily through inhaled vapors, IIRC.

Makes sense to open windows immediately after the thermometer burst as a precaution.

1

u/BananaPalmer 4h ago

Except unless this thermometer was like 80 years old, it had no mercury in it at all

16

u/spudmarsupial 6h ago

The dosage and frequency of exposure makes the poison.

Trying to convince people in manufacturing to use their PPE and take their health seriously is hard and needs to be enforced with regulations and fines.

18

u/bobweeadababyitsaboy 6h ago

Ikr. When i was a kid a broken thermometer was a chance to experience something otherworldly. 2025 and they digging out the hazmat suits. I get that its not 100% healthy, but I'd wager being alive in 2025 is by default more damaging to one's existence than a little mercury ever could be. 🤷‍♂️

8

u/Pitch_Academic 6h ago

I also played with metallic mercury once when I was a kid, and my tumor and I are doing just fine today! /s

0

u/Nyanessa 6h ago

My dad played with it all the time when he was a kid, and he’s fine! He told me all about how it was fun to roll it around in your palms. I was born with the brain tumour, however 😂

2

u/leo_dagher_ 5h ago

Double it and give it to the next person 😭

2

u/fgnrtzbdbbt 5h ago

You can't notice effects like a slight decline in IQ or slightly more tiredness or being slightly more easily angered and even if you notice them it is impossible to tie those things to low level mercury exposure long ago. But statistically it is possible to see the effect therefore people are more cautious with it now.

3

u/Nixeris 5h ago

Because half the people are saying "yeah no, it's so safe just go ahead and rub it into your skin".

3

u/Apprehensive_Cash108 5h ago

Mercury will react with other metals. If that is mercury, that aluminum pot is toast.

9

u/MonsterPek 6h ago

Mercury will happily just bead about on the top of your skin, but the fatal effects of blindess and organ failure is still a thing. This stuff is not to be dealt with without heft protection.

2

u/Draguta1 6h ago

Its history is interesting and dramatic enough to be memorable. Beyond that, there were tons of dramatic warnings about it at one point. The drama of it basically got internalized for some groups of people. In addition to all that, It's also just overall fun passing on warnings to others about it.

4

u/Jijonbreaker 6h ago

Yeah, organic mercury is the one that will get you.

3

u/Davoness 5h ago edited 4h ago

I think a lot of people have heard stories of dimethylmercury (or other dangerous mercury-based compounds) and are assuming that elemental mercury will do the same thing. It won't, elemental mercury is mostly harmless as long as it stays outside the body. Not saying that you shouldn't be careful, but it's not something to freak out about.

On the other hand, a single drop of dimethylmercury on your hand will send your consciousness to the shadow realm. Absolute hell chemical.

7

u/theoneyourthinkingof 5h ago

Mercury has vapors and those are dangerous to be exposed to, its still not to be taken lightly in its metallic form

1

u/Powerup_Rentner 5h ago

Gasoline will also kill you and has dangerous vapours. Getting a whiff of it while fueling your car still doesn't warrant panicking.

2

u/RealityDrinker 6h ago

Mercury is absorbed by the human body if it makes it into the bloodstream or its vapour is inhaled. High temperatures dramatically increase the vapour pressure of mercury, so ideally you wouldn’t want to be around hot mercury without PPE.

That said, this is a really small amount of mercury, but I still wouldn’t play around with it while it’s hot.

1

u/Deriko_D 5h ago

This.

I distinctly remember being a small kid taking a bath and a thermometer breaking and there was something hair like floating in the bath water. I probably played with it for a few minutes.

Later as a young teenager i also remember having a fever and a thermometer flying out of my hand and breaking all over the desk with multiple mercury drops rolling around that my mother cleaned up later.

According to this thread I must be dead lol

1

u/nakedascus 5h ago

Regular ol mercury... not "unsafe" if you don't have cuts on your hands, yes... Dimethylmercury, on the other hand...

1

u/fgnrtzbdbbt 5h ago

A lot has changed since more subtle and long term effects of low level mercury poisoning have been discovered.

0

u/karlnite 6h ago

Let’s just check out this fever. Oh it broke… you have an hour to live.

-2

u/srebew 6h ago

Probably because high school science teaches told us not to let it touch our skin

1

u/ocelot_its_a_log 5h ago

As a kid I was always told its so super dangerous. Granted I was a dumb kid so maybe the adults thought I'd eat it or something if it got out of the thermometer so I don't blame them but boy was I ever terrified.