The Mother of All Biological Evils

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P) November

10, 2004

The Mother of All Biological Evils

by --Reporter: Kountze

Early one Sunday morning, Nikki Swanson watched her family's 1860s farmhouse

in tiny Nickerson, Neb., go up in flames. It was a deliberate act of

destruction, but it was not arson. The local fire department was using the place

for a

practice burn because, despite its pleasant exterior of yellow, beige and

cranberry with white trim, toxic mold had rendered the Swanson house

uninhabitable.

That fire in 2002 was a drastic solution to an increasingly common problem.

But why is mold -- the spores of which have wafted through the air for eons --

making the headlines so often these days? And why are there so many stories

about homeowners fighting with insurance companies over who has to pay for the

damage?

As Swanson and her husband, Steve, discovered too late, mold is the natural

result of unchecked moisture -- the fungus simply can't grow without it. " The

bottom line is, when a house gets wet, you have to dry it out, " warns

Ouellette, retired clinical professor of medicine at the University of

Wisconsin,

who consults with building scientists and homebuilders. " Mold is a problem of

water. It is the mother of biological evils. " And thanks to the law of

unintended consequences, today's structures are much less forgiving of water

intrusion than were houses a mere three decades ago, Ouellette says.

Homebuilders responded to the energy crisis of the 1970s by tightening up

houses to increase energy efficiency. " Insulation does what it's supposed to do

-- stop the transfer of energy, " notes Yost, an indoor-air-quality

consultant for Building Science Corp., in Columbus, Ohio. " But energy dries

things

out. " The result: Places that used to get wet but dried out quickly now retain

moisture and act as incubators for mold.

Modern building materials add to the problem. Plywood and products with high

cellulose or paper content are more susceptible to water damage than solid

lumber. " We probably have fewer leaks, but the materials are less tolerant of

being wet, " Yost says.

Anatomy of a disaster Ironically, it's likely that well-intentioned

" improvements " the Swansons made to their century-old house exacerbated the mold

problem that led to its destruction. In 1994, Nikki, 31, and Steve, 36, bought

the

house she grew up in from her grandmother, in part because they wanted to keep

it in the family. As the Swansons raised their three children, they made

renovations, including tightening up the old house to save energy. Soon the

family

was plagued with mysterious ailments: recurring headaches, nosebleeds and

upper-respiratory problems.

 

During one home-improvement project, the Swansons ripped out the living-room

carpeting and found mold on the floorboards that was apparently emanating from

a root cellar located directly below. The cellar drew ground moisture

throughout the house, but the home improvements had trapped the moisture,

creating

mold.

 

The family's health problems intensified after water poured through the house

during a powerful rainstorm. When Nikki suffered a severe asthma attack, the

family abandoned their home -- and began to feel better. Testing revealed mold

contamination, and contractors that the Swansons consulted declared that it

would be cheaper to demolish the house and rebuild from the ground up than to

try to get rid of the mold.

 

" We lost our house and about 60% of everything in it, " Nikki says. The

Swansons sold the land but were out the value of the house, which they put at

$90,000. Because their insurance company said the damage wasn't covered by their

policy, the family " didn't see a penny of insurance " during the ordeal, she

says.

 

They're not alone. Home insurers have moved to shift the financial burden for

mold losses on to homeowners by adding policy exclusions for mold, says

Dybdahl, a senior consultant for American Risk Management Resources Network,

in Middleton, Wis. He says insurers have been taking a bath on mold coverage,

with an estimated $8 billion in mold-related claims in 2002. There's no

precedent for claims of this magnitude, he says, so insurance companies have

reacted

by severely curtailing coverage.

 

Check with your insurer to see if your current homeowners policy covers mold

damage and, if not, whether you can buy extra coverage. As you weigh the cost

of such added protection, be aware that it can cost a small fortune to solve a

severe mold problem, even if the cure doesn't entail burning your house to

the ground. Clinton, former owner of a mold-infested home in

Pennsylvania's Bucks County, learned that lesson the hard way. It cost $125,000

to

eliminate mold from his decade-old, four-bedroom colonial in Chalfont, after

Tropical

Storm doused the living room and basement with water.

Protect your home The first, and best, defense against household mold is to

control moisture and clean up water leaks right away. " If you clean up water

immediately, you won't have a mold problem, " advises Larkin, founder of

Mold Relief, in Norman, Okla. Use your home's exhaust fans routinely, especially

in the bathroom, as part of a diligent effort to get moisture out of your

house.

 

Larkin established the nonprofit agency -- which provides financial

assistance to mold victims forced from their homes--after mold caused by

undetected

water damage drove her and her family from their rented condominium a year and a

half ago. The group's web site offers helpful information on mold and

mold-related services.

 

 

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