Don't clean your moldy house and belongings with neurotoxic chemicals

[Guest guest]

Am forwarding this from Barbara Wilkie who sits with me on the national

committee for the Chemical Injury Information Network. It should

be of interest to those living or working in sick buildings.

Hotz

****************

Dear All --

And my two bits worth based upon my own body's reactions, as well as

those from others -- I get lots of mail and I've learned from those

who have written.

It seems for so very many of us, it's not so hard to take what Mother

Nature throws our way -- assuming it isn't an overload -- if we

haven't befouled our environment with our manmade coverups, be they

for personal care or household or janitorial cleaning and

maintenance. And in the case of molds, the first thing most folks

seem to want to do is hook up the air " fresheners " and room

deodorizers whether that is a school with an IAQ problem, an office

or a home. And once you have any manmade scent emitting, you've got

air pollution of another dynamic.

In our case, our second child was six when we moved into our home and

she developed really bad asthma at that time in her life. As she was

six quite a number of years ago, we had to deal not only with her

asthma, but also with the behavioral scientists who were always

feeding someone somewhere some pap about asthma being ALL IN THE

HEAD! Well, I knew otherwise, and I'd argue my daughter's case for

her, I just didn't know exactly what could cause the asthma, except

for one blanket which she dearly loved, but for some reason could not

have anywhere near her . . . It gave her asthma when I put it on her

bed after she was asleep -- I NEVER did that again, but it also was

grist for my mill against the behavioral scientists who used to mouth

off.

Turns out, there was a leak in an overhead pipe, that affected the

ceiling of the kitchen, but since the people before us had put up

thick sheetrock over the original plaster, we didn't have a clue . .

.. until a leak in one spot became obvious. We had a mold farm

overhead that you wouldn't believe, which meant that it was also

underfoot in the two upstairs bathrooms . . . and the bedrooms were

on the other side of the hall from the bathrooms. Three kids, two

adults and only one diagnosed with asthma at that time. As it turns

out, I was living with undiagnosed asthma since I was a child of

five, but I never did the classic wheezing, therefore, it wasn't

until rather late in my life that I was diagnosed asthmatic. The

mainstream medical industry, it seems, had a learning curve. (What, I

should be so surprised about mainstream medical not getting MCS?)

Once we got that mold out of here and washed everything down with

vinegar we've never had another problem with mold and our young

daughter's chronic asthma improved dramatically. As she entered

adulthood, asthma her asthma all but disappeared. She won swim meets,

diving and gymnastic championships . . . taking diving into Jr.

College.

So, back to the article on

http://www.acoem.org/guidelines/article.asp?ID=52 and my bias intact

as I read these terrible recommendations from the American College of

Occupational

and Environmental Medicine on how to get rid of mold:

" After the source of moisture that supports mold growth has been

eliminated, active mold growth can be eliminated. Colonized porous

materials, eg, clothing or upholstery, can be cleaned using appropriate

routine methods, eg, washing or dry cleaning clothing, and need not

be discarded unless cleaning fails to restore an acceptable appearance. "

I cringe whenever I see our " experts " recommending cleaning " using

appropriate routine methods. " The experts never take the opportunity

to inform the public that they should clean with eco-friendly,

fragrance- and dye-free products. People routinely clean with highly

scented detergents, fabric softeners, cleaners for floors, rugs and

upholstery. People routinely plug-in, stick-on and pull-up all sorts

of room deodorizers and " fresheners. " And whenever mold has been a

problem in a public venue, you can be sure that someone, somewhere is

going to do the fragrance cover-up routine rather than deal with the

problem.

And therein lies the new problem as fragrance chemicals include:

Benzene, Toluene, Napthelene, Phenol and Xylene -- Musk Xylol and Musk

Ketone

---Raw Materials of Perfumery -

http://www.perfumersworld.com/chems/material.htm

-- barb wilkie