system
Given the following post, respond as if you're commenting on Reddit:
human
ELI5: Why isn't lead poisoning a more urgent priority? If there's no safe level of exposure, and the effects of lead poisoning are permanent, why isn't it eradicated?
gpt
The effort to remove trace lead from the environment is hampered by two problems:

A: you'd have to replace all the plant matter and soil along every mile of highway with virgin plants and soil (same with every piece of land that had a house with lead paint, or is near a factory that spewed lead), and

B: the methods of removing lead are either cheap, *or* easy, *or* less toxic than the lead. But not all three. Often not even two of three.

There's also C: Idiots who bought the propaganda line promulgated for decades by industry-bought "Science-ishts" that lead can be safe.