imported post
JOVARN wrote:
Well Wilma is gone and my new screen room suffered zero damage.
Every tree in my community is gone and the tree trimmers are making a fortune, do you think any of them are in the S&P?
My Kitchen ceiling has a few wet spots but all in all I did ok.
Glad to hear your safe JOVARN. Make sure you treat those wet spots so that no mold forms.
M_M
Breaking the mold
In "Rebuilding America's Atlantis," my three-part Daily Dose series last month after September's hurricane Katrina laid waste to historic New Orleans, I warned about the coming "second disaster" of toxins in the water supply and infection caused by stagnating standing water.
But another threat has emerged that may prove more even sickening to the populace and costly to contend with as both of these other fears combined: Mold infestation.
Anywhere there's moisture, there's mold. In any given house, there's likely some mold, somewhere. Usually, it's fairly small scale, contained and easily dealt with using ordinary household cleaners or a 10% dilution of regular bleach. And despite recent years' hype in the mainstream over alleged mold-related illnesses, if it doesn't get out of control, most of the time a little household mold won't cause more than a passing lung irritation or some minor breathing struggles.
However, in places like the moist, warm sub-tropical American south, mold tends to be more of a problem than in cooler, dryer regions. And when flooding or periods of extended submersion occurs in these zones, the aftermath can be mold infestation on a scale that's hard to combat. Such is proving to be the case on an unprecedented scale in the now-drained New Orleans...
According to a recent Associated Press report, experts fear that the mold infestation in many homes is so pervasive in the aftermath of Katrina that they'll need to be leveled and rebuilt. Ordinarily, after a flood, simply cleaning and repainting walls and replacing any household items with water-holding cushions (sofas, mattresses) goes a long way toward erasing the presence of mold.
But since in many zones of NOLA, homes remained at least partially submerged for days and even weeks, evidence is piling up suggesting that entire homes (even down to the wooden studs) are now past the point where conventional methods of mold eradication will do any good. These houses are now nothing more than greenhouses for mold - and are quite hazardous indeed, especially to those with asthma or severe allergies.
And houses aren't the only areas of concern in post-Katrina New Orleans. Office buildings, businesses, schools, and hospitals are all fertile breeding grounds for these sickening spores. At least one area hospital (Charity Hospital) has been temporarily shut down because of concerns about mold-related infections. Other hospitals that remain open expect the mold cleanup to take months. And if it isn't done properly, these places could become hubs of illness instead of healing. According to the AP piece, one official from the Joint Commission on Accreditation of Healthcare Organizations claims it may be difficult to impossible to reopen some NOLA medical centers.
What makes matters worse is that in the last decade, a lot of insurance companies have revised their coverage policies to exempt themselves from mold-damage related claims after several successful "sick building" lawsuits.
These policy changes haven't been only aimed at big businesses with pockets deep enough to be able to afford to rebuild without an insurance company bailing them, but at rank-and-file homeowners, too. The AP article maintains it's because there's little science behind claims of mold-related illnesses...
The net effect is that thousands of homes whose structures have withstood the waters may have to be razed anyway - with homeowners somehow footing the bills. This could be a major fiscal crisis-in-the-making for the already beleaguered region.
Bottom line: The extent of the mold infestation in New Orleans - and the extent of needed demolition and reconstruction because of it - won't be known for some time. But as I said before, regardless of what it costs or how long it takes, I still think we should rebuild this great metropolis on the Mississippi - and do it right this time. It's simply too important to our history and heritage to allow it to be consumed by mud, mold, and mosquitoes of the swamp it's surrounded by...
That's easy for me to say, though. I'm not trying to salvage my waterlogged house with no insurance to help, no gun to protect myself from desperate vandals, and no guarantee from the government that another storm won't do the same thing next year - or a week from now.
Like many who've fled the Big Easy for good, that might prove more than I could take.
Still mournin' N'awlins,
William Campbell Douglass II, MD