Does mold make you sick? Doctors seek answers

[Guest guest]

Does mold make you sick? Doctors seek answers

Reuters via News*

By Maggie Fox, Health and Science Editor Maggie Fox, Health And

Science Editor – Tue Oct 28

http://news./s/nm/20081028/hl_nm/us_mold_illness_2

WASHINGTON (Reuters) – Fungus expert Joan did not believe in

so-called toxic mold -- the cause of " sick building syndrome " and

many lawsuits -- until her New Orleans home was flooded during

Hurricane Katrina in 2005.

When she got a whiff of the foul air that the black goo had created

in her home, she decided to change her research focus and try to

find out how and if the fungi that took over most of the flooded

homes on the Gulf Coast might make people ill.

" The overwhelming obnoxiousness of the odor and of the enveloping

air made me start to believe in something that I had never believed

in before -- sick building syndrome, " , of Rutgers University

in New Jersey, told a news conference.

But it has been more difficult than she thought.

believes that molds could potentially cause illness in

certain susceptible people via volatile organic compounds -- gassy

versions of chemicals produced as the organisms metabolize food.

She has been unable to show this in the lab so far. But she told a

joint meeting of the American Society for Microbiology and the

Infectious Diseases Society of America.

She has tested various molds on the laboratory roundworm C.

elegans. " Sometimes the worm swims away and sometimes the worm does

nothing and sometimes the worm eats the fungus, " said.

" I am actually looking for something that has never been discovered

by methods that have never been worked out. "

Yet hundreds of lawsuits have been filed -- and some won -- by

people claiming mold in their homes or workplaces has made them ill.

Dr. Denning of the University of Manchester in Britain said it

is plausible that molds and fungi would emit volatile organic

compounds.

GENETIC SENSITIVITY

If these can be found, they could form the basis of diagnosing

fungal illness as well -- perhaps using a breath test. People with

fungal infections of the lungs, such as aspergillosis, would release

these chemicals when they breathed.

" A certain group of severe asthmatics -- about a million people --

are sensitive to a number of different fungi, " Denning told the news

conference. These include Aspergillis and Candida.

" This is almost certainly a genetic issue, " he added. " If you have

(a) predisposition (to asthma), you probably have an additional

predisposition to fungal sensitization. "

Dr. Goldman, a pediatrician in the Bronx, New York, said

asthma rates in his borough are disproportionately high, and he

blames in part Cryptococcus neoformins, a microbe found in pigeon

droppings that causes disease in immune-compromised people.

" We believe this fungus contributes to asthma by modulating the

immune response, " Goldman told the news conference.

Both Goldman and Denning said treating patients with antifungal

drugs such as itraconozole and fluconazole helped relieve the

symptoms of patients with severe asthma. This supports evidence that

fungi are contributing to symptoms.

All three experts agreed it would likely take a combination of

factors -- including a person genetically susceptible to molds and

unusual fungal activity -- to cause any disease.

" It is probably a relatively temporary disease, not a life-

threatening disease, " Denning said.

" As we sit here we are probably breathing in hundreds of spores, "

added. " Usually we only get sick if our immune systems are

compromised or if we have this genetic susceptibility to allergy. "

(Reporting by Maggie Fox; Editing by Steenhuysen and Philip

Barbara)