Magnus is now selling possibly harmful silica chalk with Rungne. WHY ???

 Silica silylate has been mostly tested as a cosmetic ingredient. From an amateur review of some of the safety studies, the body does seem to clear it from the lungs when inhaled. However, the test results showed that in animal tests it took several months for it to clear. It did not cause cancer. It seems at the minimum to be more irritating than chalk. I’m not thrilled about this becoming an additional indoor air pollutant. It really seems inappropriate for everyday gym use. And I had no idea this is an ingredient in Super Chalk! Glad I use a chalk ball.

Y'all know who we need to call about this, right?

Eric Moss wrote:

The party of love and compassion, ladies and gentlemen.

lol if you’re calling me a democrat you’d be wrong. I have democrat friends who think I’m a republican and vice versa. There’s nonsense and good ideas on either side. Or rather what the idealism of pre trump republicans were, and what democrats were before general insanity.

I would also argue that it is indeed demonstrating love and compassion to not want children to die horrible deaths of preventable illnesses.

edit- there is a lot more craziness and bad behavior from the uber trump republicans typically. Ie sitting down with actual neo Nazis. 

Eric Moss wrote:

The party of love and compassion, ladies and gentlemen.

Are you the party of law and order? 

Oh, and family values?

I never gave much thought to chalk.  But hearing that chalk may contain silica.  Now it has my attention.  Imagine hearing that asbestos was a great drying agent and was being added to chalk.  Get my point.

I think all climbers and climbing gyms should be aware of this potential health hazard ie inhaling silica dust.

I am sure many have heard of asbestosis.  There is a similar disease called silicosis.  Not identical but similar in nature.  Both are real and devastating.  And thankfully the former has become much less common due to increased awareness and regulations.  Asbestosis and silicosis generally take years/decades to become clinically significant.  And inhaled silica particles do not dissolve (unless you work in a foundry) and if the particles are small enough to travel to the terminal bronchioles/alveoli, you will take them to your grave.  

And one final thought for parents.  Children have no/little choice in what chalk they use.  The next time I buy a block of chalk, I will definitely be looking at the ingredients.  Caveat emptor.

JCM wrote:

Do you think it could work to make a liquid chalk with silica added? That seems like it could be a way to easily apply it as a pre-route base cost, without the issues of having a bunch of loose powder silica.

We tried this. We mixed in silica with regular liquid chalk. It caused enough skin irritation in informal testing that we didn't bother getting it properly dermatologically tested. Silica-based anti-perspirants have been around for a while, nothing new under the sun.

Alan Rubin wrote:

Thanks, but what does a "safe exposure limit" percentage mean in 'real life'? I, honestly, ( and, again, believe that many others are in the same situation) don't know if "1% of that for chalk" is a good or bad thing, nor if "40 %" in this context is better or worse. Also, don't know what the 'chalk' exposure baseline or any of this means in terms of potential health risks. I apologize for not being a scientist.

I am not certain myself.  Environmental/occupational health isn't my area of expertise, so take all this with a grain of salt, and someone let me know if I get anything wrong.  

Risk is a function of hazard, exposure, and vulnerability, which is to say, there's a lot of factors to take into account. Is the space closed?  Are your lungs in good health to begin with?  How old are you? Is there air movement?  Are the particulates suspended?  I haven't been able to find any studies that directly evaluate the risks associated with silica in climbing chalk in a climbing gym environment (which is another consideration, given that the silica is mixed with magnesium carbonate) or compare these to 100% magnesium carbonate chalks.  However, I would personally like to limit my exposure to something that *may* incur marginally higher health risks in certain contexts based on what little data I have.  Quite possible that it wouldn't matter, but I think it'd be reasonable to apply precautionary principle in a case where the reward seems pretty much nil for me.  

El Duderino wrote:

I am not certain myself.  Environmental/occupational health isn't my area of expertise, so take all this with a grain of salt, and someone let me know if I get anything wrong.  

Risk is a function of hazard, exposure, and vulnerability, which is to say, there's a lot of factors to take into account. Is the space closed?  Are your lungs in good health to begin with?  How old are you? Is there air movement?  Are the particulates suspended?  I haven't been able to find any studies that directly evaluate the risks associated with silica in climbing chalk in a climbing gym environment (which is another consideration, given that the silica is mixed with magnesium carbonate) or compare these to 100% magnesium carbonate chalks.  However, I would personally like to limit my exposure to something that *may* incur marginally higher health risks in certain contexts based on what little data I have.  Quite possible that it wouldn't matter, but I think it'd be reasonable to apply precautionary principle in a case where the reward seems pretty much nil for me.  

Of course, there is the question of the safety level of that 'grain of salt'!!!!

Seriously, I agree that the potential problem of silica in climbing chalk is a real concern and that in such circumstances better safe than sorry is the best approach until further information is available. However, the bottom line is that unless such chalk additives are banned or become commercially not viable, we, especially those of us who frequent climbing gyms, are at the 'mercy' of the other users, who may either not be aware of the issues or just not care.

Eric Moss wrote:

Well keep doing it, then.  I'm doing fine without it.  To each his own.

How do you know? The million or so who have died from covid-19 also were doing fine...until they weren't.

If you had asymptomatic covid (how would you know?), how many people did you infect? Were they over 80? Were they cancer patients who have no immunity? Did any have a serious hospital stay? Did any die?

Marc801 C wrote:

How do you know? The million or so who have died from covid-19 also were doing fine...until they weren't.

If you had asymptomatic covid (how would you know?), how many people did you infect? Were they over 80? Were they cancer patients who have no immunity? Did any have a serious hospital stay? Did any die?

I don't know, how many did you infect?

I can't get over the irony: the same people afraid of a new untested chalk substitute, are so zealous about a new untested gene therapy.    

I've got alot of serious questions about inhaling the stuff, however quoting health risks for crystaline silica when discusing an amorphous silica product is almost as daft as thinking an mRNA vaccine is gene therapy.

They were classified as gene therapy until needed to sell it to the public.

I am asking once again. Is V5 chuffing? 

Eric Moss wrote:

They were classified as gene therapy until needed to sell it to the public.

Do you have some references? 

Any chance you boomers could go talk about bread and circuses in a containment thread somewhere? This is about the frontiers of aid climbing and risking permanent lung damage to send the pink v3 in the corner, not performative shit flinging contests. Thanks!

WF WF51 wrote:

Do you have some references? 

Believe it or not I'm actually going to defend him (in part).

When first developed mRNA vaccines where a new technology and didn't neatly fit with existing some definitions of a vaccine so in some jurisitctions are covered by gene therapy regulations, such as the EU but not US, to fit them into an existing regulatory framework. They do not modify the patients genome in anyway, the standard definition of gene therapy, even though oppenents try to exploit this regulatory difference as implying they do.

Just to be clear mRNA vaccines do not alter the recipients DNA in anyway and any claims, implied or direct, that they do are bogus.

Good thing the gov't stopped funding science that would cure diseases.

No need to argue about it anymore.

Chalk lung? Hah. How about measles and polio? That'll get your attention. 

Jabroni McChufferson wrote:

I am asking once again. Is V5 chuffing? 

It is in my gym!

Anyone try that honduras enhanced muscle growth/reduced inflammation gene therapy?

Man... this is a lot to try to breakdown... but the long... and short of it:
"How much is in it?"
"How much would get into the air in a climbing gym?"
"... would that much really get into the air considering how ungodly expensive it is?"

* The dose makes the poison
* The route of exposure can matter a ton - inhalation vs. ingestion, etc...
* Various silica additives are quite literally in nearly everything around you
* Magnesium Carbonate isn't great to inhale either
* TL;DR - stop reading now unless you want a wall of text

Silicon dioxide, SiO2, quartz, sand, etc... is all around us. 60% of earth's crust -ish. There are different forms, and modifications of forms of it that have been used for various reasons in nearly f-ing everything around us. I mean modifications in that, chemically, the bulk of it is still SiO2, but some amount of different chemical functional groups have been added to the surface of the particles, typically via treatment with some form of silane, which gets into the realm of silicones... which are synthetically made polymers containing the element silicon, Si, but other stuff too. You can get hydrophobic (water repelling) or hydrophilic (water attracting) properties of various magnitudes, which can have beneficial effects to additives used in different ways.

There are numerous "forms" of silicon dioxide.

Amorphous silica, which includes several forms, pretty much lacks much of a repeating crystal structure:
* fumed silica, precipitated silica, colloidal silica, and silica gel... or just generally referred to as amorphous silica if you are given less info on it
* these kinds of forms are commonly used as additives
* Often, but not necessarily always, these forms may have a silanol group, -SiOH, on their surfaces after being manufactured as a result of the process, making them hydrophilic, water loving... but high temp processes will tend to not have this.
* these forms are definitely LESS bad for your lungs than crystalline
* these forms in small amounts like what normal people are exposed to just being the consumers that humans are, seems to be "fine"
* If you are dealing with a lot of them and they are getting into the air and being inhaled, like working in industrial formulation using them or adding them to resin you are mixing up and using to make a surfboard, or other such similar situations... yeah, protect yourself. All of these amorphous forms are very low density and can become airborne easily.

Crystalline silica, has more of a repeating crystal structure:
* quartz, and other less common forms... these are more typically in like concrete, playground sand, ceramics glaze additives, dust from construction, dirt, the rocks we climb on, etc...
* this form should not really come up in this discussion... unless like you want to get into how much is released into the air because Honnold crushes too hard on the rocks he climbs or Ten Sleep has too many manufactured pockets or another anti-bolting rant.
* this form is definitely bad for your lungs

Silicosis
This is highly correlated with people with chronic exposure to primarily crystalline silica, concrete dust, rock dust, etc, through work. Quarry workers, stone masons, people running concrete saws all the time, demolition work, construction trades, etc... Surely there are others with it from chronic work exposure to amorphous silicas in some industries like formulation or using it as fillers in resins, etc... Use PPE.

Silica, SiO2, can be hydrophobic or hydrophilic, to various degrees depending on the form and any surface treatment.

A great deal of the silica we are exposed to in products is used as a processing aid for powders to prevent them from caking, to keep them as free flowing powders which can reduce or eliminate the need for extra processing equipment and steps to break up chunks and lead to more consistent bulk density to allow simple volume measurement instead of relying on weight measurement. If you go into your pantry and pull out all of your powdered good and read the labels, you will very commonly find some form of silica listed as the last ingredient. Same for tablets of supplements, vitamins, medicines, its usually there to help processing while the stuff is a powder, even though it may no longer serve much of a purpose once the stuff is compressed into a tablet or packaged in a pill... but sometimes it also helps get a target dissolution rate. Its also in things to reduce foaming. Can be a desiccant, though typically for this use it is separated from the product... but not always. If you use makeup, often a lot of it is silica in some form as a filler.

Different particle sizes will tend to be handled by the lungs differently... and who knows what we are actually getting.

Silica silylate
This is silica that has been modified with functional groups on the surface of particles... which form of silica that has been modified is not really available in this description. After treatment, it will be hydrophobic, or water repelling. How that will enhance grip... I don't know. Essentially whatever form of silica had -SiOH groups on the surface, and those were reacted with something else to take the hydrophilic property and instead turn it hydrophobic.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hydrophobic_silica

A research paper that maybe could explain things a bit:
https://www.researchgate.net/publication/256930528_Frictional_forces_between_hydrophilic_and_hydrophobic_particle_coated_nanostructured_surfaces

Fumed, but even less inflammation than otherwise:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cWS52wzKLf0

FDA additive number specs may need to be revised:
https://pmc.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/articles/PMC7009582/

Slowly, over time, it will lose its hydrophobic properties due to various things like:
* UV degradation of the surface functional group treatment
* friction physically breaking apart particles exposing more non-treated surface area
* hydrolysis in acidic or basic conditions or oxidation stripping the surface coating
* biological attack

In the lungs, hydrophobic is more resistant to attack, degradation, and elimination than hydrophilic.
In the stomach, hydrophobic is attacked quickly and eliminated.

I imagine one could probably engineer a hydrophobic one where the surface treatment breaks down easier in lungs than otherwise.
... Whether that is deemed cost-effective for something that is already very expensive... ?

You are supposed to apply a very small amount of it to your hands before you chalk up with normal chalk... I wonder if some women have been applying more of it to their faces in makeup than climbers would apply to their hands. Seriously, silica is in so many different products, and hydrophobic silica is also used in many makeups and sunscreens already.