Research on mold flawed, files show

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Research on mold flawed, files show

Threat to health overstated, some say

By Byron / Special Contributor to The Dallas Morning News

04/26/2001

Workers gaze upward at the new Gables at Ravello apartments off Road

near McKinney Avenue in Dallas. The men are preparing to rip off the roof.

On television

Byron of WFAA-TV (Channel 8) tracks down the scientists whose work

defined black mold as a health hazard, and he shows why many experts

question that research as solid science - Thursday and Friday on the News 8

Update at 10 p.m.

Patches of black mold have been found in the drywall of three of 35 units,

and the owners say the tenants must leave because the mold, which some

authorities blame for illnesses, has to be removed.

For construction and some health-care workers, black mold - Stachybotrys

atra - is gold.

But the idea that black mold poses a critical - perhaps even deadly - health

risk to people is based on research that the federal government says was

flawed.

Removal of black mold in some government and school buildings across the

Dallas-Fort Worth area has cost millions of dollars in health care and

building repairs. Soon, workers will begin removing the mold from the Gables

at Ravello, as they have from Carrollton Fire Department No. 3, the Farmers

Branch library and eight other sites.

Some public officials, parents and administrators have pushed for the

cleanups because they fear that the mold could lead to health problems,

including breathing difficulty, nasal congestion, headaches, memory loss,

mood swings, skin irritation, fever and watery or burning eyes.

But whether the health concerns are serious enough to justify million-dollar

cleanups, evacuations and building demolitions is being debated.

Research on black mold arose from events in Cleveland in 1993 and 1994.

During that two-year period in city neighborhoods, 10 infants began coughing

up blood. All were treated by Dr. Dorr Dearborn, a veteran pulmonologist at

Rainbow Babies and Children's Hospital. One child died. The phenomenon was

so unusual and frightening that Dr. Dearborn called the federal Centers for

Disease Control and Prevention for help. The CDC sent in epidemiologists.

Investigators ultimately settled on the hypothesis that Stachybotrys had

generated the illnesses, a novel theory at first.

" We thought it was plausible that we were looking at some new indoor air

contaminant, " said Dr. Montana, one of the investigators. " It piqued

our interest, and we pursued it. "

Dr. Ruth Etzel, the chief epidemiologist on the project, wrote a paper in

1997 saying the sick children in the Cleveland study were " more likely than

controls to live in homes with Stachybotrys. " When the study was finished,

the CDC approved it. The work was reprinted in journals and footnoted in

articles. It became the seminal piece on black mold.

But there were skeptics, including some within the CDC. After further review

three years later, the agency concluded that investigators had made

mistakes: banging on vents to dislodge black mold spores, miscounting

samples and using botched statistics.

E-mail, letters and other internal documents obtained by WFAA-TV (Channel 8)

through the federal Freedom of Information Act outline potential problems of

insecticide contamination in the homes of the sick children. Further, the

CDC noted a separate study of children with bleeding lungs in Chicago that

found more Stachybotrys in the homes of healthy children than sick ones.

CDC officials declined through a spokeswoman to be interviewed about the

subject, saying " the science stands as written. "

An industrial hygenist who reviewed the work for the CDC said she agreed

with the criticism of the Cleveland research.

" The conclusions are overstated based on the amount of information that they

have, " Coreen Robbins said. " It's certainly being used to terrorize people. "

Byron is an investigative reporter for WFAA-TV (Channel 8). Staff

writer Randy Lee Loftis contributed to this report.