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Message: <blockquote data-quote="Ovinomancer" data-source="post: 7166740" data-attributes="member: 16814">1) Cyanide is one substance.  That it can exist in multiple forms doesn't change this, much like oxygen is in the air and in water.  The 1.5 mg/kg value is likely for gaseous cyanide, but that amount in your food should so kill you.The difference in lethal concentration vs bloodstream concentration is one of time.  The body doesn't stop being poisoned in one go, so the poison accumulates in the body.  There are a number of factors that influence applied concentration to bloodstream concentration, so the different numbers are not surprising.  Essentially, if you're exposed to a concentration of 1.5 mg/kg cyanide, unless it's very brief, you'll get plenty in your system to kill you.  Essentially, at 1.5 mg/kg concentration, you cannot metabolize it safely and will accumulate a lethal concentration.  Quickly.For interest mg/kg is the same as ppm (parts per million), so we're talking 1.5 parts per million lethal dose and 3 parts per million lethal concentration in the bloodstream.2) Cyanide kills quickly and reliably /at lethal doses/.  However, not all or even most exposures to cyanide are lethal doses and you still want to detoxify the person so they don't suffer the nasty effects of even non-lethal hypoxia.  Further, high doses that aren't lethal still induce severe hypoxia, which can cause organ damage.  So, the fact that there are treatments for cyanide poisoning do not, in any way, indicate that cyanide isn't fast acting, nor do they indicate that lethal doses aren't, you know, lethal.3)  You decontaminate a victim because cyanide is readily absorbed through the skin.  Washing a person off isn't to treat the poisoning, it's to stop additional poisoning.And, for cyanide, it really doesn't care much for how it's applied -- it doesn't change it's toxicity much due to how it enters the body.  Some, yes, but not much.  Cyanide is a generally nasty substance.4) And, if you think cyanide can be bad, do not ever look up the mechanism of VX nerve agent.  Ugly.</blockquote>

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