Mold, the fungus that gave us the wonder drug penicillin, is now being blamed for everything from asthma to cancer to immune deficiencies.

An industrial hygenist wearing a respirator suit inspects a Tristate home with mold-covered walls. (M.S. Crandall Group Inc. photo) | ZOOM |

        Increasingly, Americans are worrying — some experts say panicking — about getting sick from the black fuzz that can grow, unseen and unchecked, behind walls in our homes, schools and offices.

        So how big a problem is it?

        Some scientists call mold a potentially new, serious health threat. Others say concern is overblown. But whatever their belief, more people are paying attention.

        For the first time, the Ohio Department of Health is working with federal and local officials to clean up mold and improve air quality in schools. In the Tristate, tens of thousands of dollars are being spent to clean up mold in buildings where we work, play and sleep.

        And while national experts debate how bad the problem really is, Cincinnati researchers for the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency may have developed a way to find answers.

A hidden menace

        The Vanden Bosch family in West Chester is one of perhaps hundreds of Tristate households facing costs of cleaning up mold that grew, unbeknownst to them, in their own homes.

WARNING SIGNS

• Visible mold   • Visible water damage to building materials, carpet, furniture, etc.   • A musty, damp odor   • Unexplained symptoms such as runny nose, congestion, watery nose, sneezing and cough, headache or skin rashes.

        Mary Vanden Bosch and her son, Peter, were starting a home improvement project early in March at their 23-year-old, trilevel house. When they began peeling back wallpaper in the downstairs bathroom, they discovered unsightly fuzz underneath.

        The growth was so thick, it had eaten holes in the drywall.

        Mrs. Vanden Bosch's husband, Tom, discovered the fuzz was even more widespread when he investigated after work. So horrified was the family that they called a contractor.

        “He put on an a spacesuit and a respirator” before going into the house to do testing, Mrs. Vanden Bosch says. “I'd never seen anything like it.”

The Vanden Bosch family - Peter, Mary and Tom - in the West Chester home they had to leave for monthws because of mold. (Craig Ruttle photo) | ZOOM |

        The contractor found even more mold. It was upstairs as well — under carpet and behind wallpaper in all three bathrooms. It had eaten holes in the wooden sub-flooring.

        Lab results were even more dismaying: Mold samples in the Vanden Bosch home came back positive for Stachybotrys and Aspergillus, two common indoor molds linked to numerous health problems, including some forms of cancer, skin irritation, systemic infections, hemorrhage and convulsions.

        The family hired a company to clean up their house and moved into a hotel in April. Insurance is covering most of the cost to replace drywall and paint and carpet — estimated at $30,000 so far.

        While test results answered some questions, the Vanden Bosches wonder what health effects may linger.

        Mrs. Vanden Bosch and Peter, now nearly 8, had suffered many upper respiratory infections, coughs, headaches and sore throats. Peter was having trouble in school because he was sick so often.

        After they tore the wallpaper off, some of those symptoms got worse, Mrs. Vanden Bosch says. She developed a severe rash and was “covered in hives” at one point.

        Many of their symptoms eased after they moved out of the house. Peter is in better health, although Mrs. Vanden Bosch still has a cough she can't seem to shake.

        She's also still waiting on tests taken from a skin lesion to find out if it's cancer and another to see whether the mold and its toxins are in her bloodstream.

Thriving in the dark

        Experts blame escalating complaints about mold on contemporary construction techniques that emphasize air-tight energy conservation. Moisture provides a perfect breeding ground for mold, especially in houses that allow little air in or out.

MORE ABOUT MOLD

• How to get control • Answers to common questions

        That's because mold feeds on rotting organic matter. And it grows everywhere — on building materials, grass, dead leaves, newspapers, books, firewood, grain, fruit, bread and soil. Under a microscope, mold looks like a vibrant mixture of red, orange, yellow or green.

        It's routine to find mold on shower walls or around window air-conditioners where moisture condenses. Usually, people clean these areas regularly. But mold thrives where it is hidden away — inside walls, under carpet and in damp attics and basements.

        Its ill effects can include allergic reactions, resulting in runny noses, itchy eyes, rashes and asthma.

        It also can be infectious, meaning people can inhale mold spores, which then begin growing in the body, resulting in permanent tissue and organ damage. Histoplasmosis is a common form of mold infection in the Ohio Valley.

        In its worst form, molds produce mycotoxins, which can interfere with cellular and DNA function, resulting in cancers and other problems.

        Mike Crandall, a certified industrial hygienist and owner of M.S. Crandall Group Inc. in Norwood, frequently lectures on the best way to prevent and clean up mold damage.

        “Everyone, it seems, has an interest in mold these days,” Mr. Crandall says. Last month, a Texas jury awarded $32 million to a woman who sued her insurance company for not covering mold damage claims. That verdict “got everybody talking and thinking about mold, particularly if you own buildings.”

        Mold in schools has been in the headlines here.

        In April, a classroom in Robert E. Lucas Intermediate School in the Princeton school district was closed for the rest of the school year because of mold.

        Maple Dale Elementary School in Blue Ash was closed for two days in February after officials discovered potentially dangerous mold on a single ceiling tile in a storage closet.

        And at Lawrenceburg, Ind., High School, several rooms were closed in March while heating and cooling systems were cleaned and wallpaper and water-damaged ceilings were removed.

        John Gayetsky, an industrial hygienist with the Ohio Department of Health, has helped officials at 10 area schools identify potential problems affecting the air that students breathe. Flat roofs, for example, can contribute to a problem if rain can't easily run off, he says.

        Mr. Gayetsky is working with schools to implement the “Tools for Schools” program, an EPA training program that emphasizes improving indoor air quality in school buildings. State and federal funding funding for the program totaled $44,000 for 2000-2001.

        The Vanden Bosches blame a leaky water pipe for their mold problem. They discovered the leak and had it fixed soon after they moved into the home in 1997, but the damage was already done.

Mold 101

        Baby boomers were taught that living things are divided into two kingdoms, plants and animals. Now, science students learn that fungi are a kingdom of their own. Types of fungi include mushrooms, mildew and mold.

        There are hundreds of kinds of mold; scientists can't even agree on how many. One kind — Penicillium — gives us the antibiotic penicillin.

        But the bigger debate is how big a public health threat mold poses.

        Dr. Eckhart Johanning, an Albany, N.Y., mold expert and the head of the Fungal Research Group, is concerned.

        “Mold has great public health impact. If we can make a small dent in this, I think we will make a great difference in people's quality of life,” Dr. Johanning says.

        Dr. Ronald Gots disagrees. An environmental health and toxicology expert, he's the head of the International Center for Toxicology and Medicine in Washington, D.C.

        “People abandon houses and close schools, and there's no reason for it,” he says. “It's just out of control. It's totally out of control.”

        Dr. Gots blames a number of factors for what he calls undue panic over indoor mold, including high-profile lawsuits and more advertising from contractors who specialize in testing for or cleaning up mold.

        “I'm getting brochures every day that are titled, How to Make Money in Mold. There are plaintiff's lawyers who are filing lawsuits every day,” he says.

        “There's media hype. There is a wildly active and very chaotic industry made up of all sorts of people with varying expertise about what to test and how to test and how much cleanup is necessary. And there's very little medical input.”

        Dr. Malcolm Adcock, health commissioner for the city of Cincinnati, calls references to toxic mold “an overstatement.” He says that for most people, mold is simply an allergen, not a deadly poison.

        “I'm not downplaying it, but I think it's been raised to more of a concern than it warrants, given the types of problems that it normally causes,” Dr. Adcock says. “People don't think a thing at all about taking a walk in the woods. If you're out walking through the woods with decaying material on the floor of the forest, you're being exposed to literally thousands of kinds of mold.”

Questions remain

        For all their differences, the experts do agree that many questions need to be answered. Among them:

        • How much mold is too much? There are national maximum exposure standards for chemicals but none for mold. It's unlikely a mold standard could be established, Dr. Johanning says. Molds are allergens, and some individuals are much more sensitive to them than others.

        And since molds are so common, it's nearly impossible to establish a mold-free environment.

        Dr. Gots is working with other researchers to compile existing background levels of molds in different settings — households, office buildings, manufacturing plants, lumberyards and other places. He's correlating that data with information on health complaints that might be related.

        • How toxic is toxic? Lab tests show mycotoxins — poisons produced by molds — cause serious health problems, including cancers, in animals. But it's difficult to detect mycotoxins in humans because they remain in the body for such short times.

        Researchers can find antigens - protein “markers” for a few mycotoxins and mold. But several different types of mold can produce the same markers, making it difficult to trace toxic effects.

        • What else may be causing health problems? Mold isn't the only thing that likes wet, dark environments. So do bacteria. It's possible that toxic effects being attributed to molds are really being caused by toxins produced by bacteria.

Science in Cincinnati

        Cincinnati researchers are at the forefront of research trying to answer some of those questions.

        At the EPA's Office of Research and Development's National Exposure Research Laboratory, molecular microbiologists Richard Haugland and Stephen Vesper have developed a way to rapidly identify different strains of mold using DNA sequencing. They're also working to determine how much mold is present from a particular sample.

        The researchers have collected DNA markers for Stachybotrys and more than 100 other problem molds.

        Currently, mold samples are sent to labs and grown — a process that can take weeks. Some molds can be identified by physical characteristics, but that method isn't always accurate.

        The method developed at the EPA's Cincinnati lab gives fast and accurate results, making it easier to tie specific molds to health complaints, and to determine “which molds are a problem and at what levels they are a problem,” Dr. Haugland says. “We hope that this can be a big piece of the puzzle.”

        The EPA is licensing the technology, and one firm in Arizona is using it commercially.

Are we ever safe?

        With so many unanswered questions, it's difficult for people and their doctors to determine the risks of mold exposure. But whether it causes a runny nose or lung infection or cancer, mold should be limited indoors.

        “It really doesn't matter what kind of mold it is,'' says Mandy Burkett, chief of the Ohio Department of Health's indoor environment section. “You need to get rid of it.”

        Members of the Vanden Bosch family hope they can move back home in another week or two, and they're adapting to life in the hotel.

        But Mrs. Vanden Bosch wonders what's next. Will her medical tests be OK? How many other families are getting sick because they don't realize mold is in their homes? Will mold re-infest her home?

        “I wonder if I'll ever feel safe there again.”
       

Mastering mold: how to get control
Answers about mold

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