It causes long-term loss of IQ, and it is the main suspect for elevated crime levels in the lead-crime hypothesis: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lead%E2%80%93crime_hypothesis
Not at all, living next to a major road is massively different from living even a few blocks away. Same for highways etc.
https://www.thelancet.com/journals/lancet/article/PIIS0140-6....
And if it's not negligence then maybe we need to raise the bar for testing such that any contamination indeed counts as negligence.
But lead is a pretty common metal. If it turns out that there's an undiscovered recessive gene for lead hyperaccumulation in the cinnamon tee and that tragedies like this are how it gets discovered, then we need to focus on raising the testing bar and not on punishment. Otherwise we create a situation where people are incentivized to hide data that could ultimately help prevent things like this in the future.
That's not what happens though, lead poisoning in spices is ~always shady actors adding pigment that's lead-heavy to make the spice (for example, cinnamon, turmeric, ground ginger, paprika) appear more vibrant in color. The Indian government did a whole bunch of work to fight against this a few years back; ultimately it's suppliers trying to adulterate their product to save money and make it look better than it is. This should absolutely be a serious crime, on the level of intentionally shipping any other dangerous product: jail time for executives, huge financial penalties for companies.
Why are markets trying to kill us?
People tainting our food supply with lead should be put behind bars for life.