Re: PCBs: Banned toxin found in wood floor finishes - 50 years after the floors were installed

[Guest guest]

Does anyone have any idea how to test for this? I searched online, but I

couldn't find anything. I am planning to move and have been looking at

some older condos with hardwood floors (one building was built in 1957; the

other one in 1936). I've already had them tested for lead paint with

lead-paint testing kits from Wal-Mart. Neither unit contained any lead.

In general, is it safer to move into something built in 1978, or thereafter?

Thanks in advance for any info! :-)

At 06:19 AM 1/18/2008 -0700, you wrote:

>PCB exposure from wood polish

>Environmental Health 2008, 7:2

><http://www.ehjournal.net/content/7/1/2>http://www.ehjournal.net/content/7/1/2

>

>Concentrations of polychlorinated biphenyls (PCBs) in air, dust and

>serum were persistently elevated in two homes. PCB-containing wood

>polishes used in the 1950s and 1960s (identified in these homes) may

>cause significant exposure.

>

>- - - -

>

>Banned toxin found in wood floor finishes

>

>Wed Jan 16, 2008 7:10pm EST

><http://www.reuters.com/article/domesticNews/idUSN1665067220080117>http://www.r\

euters.com/article/domesticNews/idUSN1665067220080117

>

>WASHINGTON (Reuters) - A wood floor finish popular in the 1950s and

>1960s may be a significant source of the banned, disease-causing

>pollutants known as PCBs, U.S. researchers reported on Wednesday.

>

>They did a case study in the homes of older women and found that those

>with a PCB-containing wood floor finish sold under the brand name

>Fabulon had very high indoor air, dust and blood levels of PCBs -- 50

>years after the floors were installed.

>

> " Use of a commercially available PCB-containing wood floor finish in

>residences during the 1950s and 1960s is an overlooked but potentially

>important source of current PCB exposure in the general population, "

>Ruthann Rudel of the Silent Spring Institute near Boston and colleagues

>wrote in their report.

>

>Many buildings, including schools, may still harbor PCB-containing floor

>finishes or other products, they wrote in the BioMed Central journal

>Environmental Health.

>

>Rudel and colleagues tested the bodies and homes of 120 women living on

>Cape Cod in Massachusetts who had been taking part in a breast cancer study.

>

> " Polychlorinated biphenyls (PCBs) are persistent pollutants identified

>worldwide as human blood and breast milk contaminants, " they wrote.

>

>They accumulate in body fat over time.

>

> " In an earlier study, we detected PCBs in indoor air in 31 percent of

>120 homes on Cape Cod, " they wrote.

>

>More testing showed the residents had very high blood levels of PCBs --

>above the 95th percentile for the U.S. population. The women lived for

>10 years or longer in homes where Fabulon had been used.

>

> " Serum concentrations in residents and air and dust concentrations were

>especially high in a home where a resident reported use of

>PCB-containing floor finish in the past, and where the floor of one room

>was sanded and refinished just prior to sample collection, " the

>researchers wrote.

>

>Production and use of PCBs was banned in the United States in 1977, with

>a very few exceptions, after studies showed they could damage the

>immune, reproductive, nervous, and endocrine systems, as well as cause

>breast cancer.

>

>(Reporting by Maggie Fox, editing by Will Dunham)

>

>© Reuters 2007. All rights reserved.

>

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><http://www4.law.cornell.edu/uscode/17/107.html>http://www4.law.cornell.edu/usc\

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