cfm-
that is a good point. there was an award winning story on NPR last year about recycling radioactive materials and re-using them in products such as forks and spoons and dental appliances.
Since lead is so poisionous even if not rqdio-active... maybe fishermen should switch to something else. i know that nothing will work as well as lead for the price but it must have some toxic effect to throw thousands of pounds of lead into the rivers each year. i am sure that some of it washes out to sea but since it is so heavy, I would guess that much stays in the river and gets deposited in the slower moving pools. after 50 years or so ,of present day fishing numbers, losing as much lead as i do could add up to alot of lead in the rivers