National Center for Healthy Housing

Have you noticed your clothes dryer getting super hot and giving off a burnt smell in the laundry room? Before you start shopping for a new one, take a look at your dryer vent which just may need a good cleaning. Lint balls are extremely flammable. Check out this Famers Insurance commercial on dryer fires.

Recently, five lives were lost in a tragedy involving carbon monoxide poisoning in Oxon Hill, MD. What killed them? It was carbon monoxide (CO) that leaked into the house from rusted and separated exhaust pipes on a natural gas furnace. According to the Washington Post, CO levels of between 140 parts per million to as high as 560 parts per million were found in the home. To put that number in perspective, 0 to 5 parts per million are considered “normal” and it takes only 30 parts per million to be fatal over time.

My family was coming to town and I didn’t have time to clean the house so I hired a cleaning crew using a “groupon” that I bought online. A crew showed up while I was getting ready for work and I caught a whiff of ammonia and other chemicals. I decided to intervene and let them know about my preference for greener products. I was prepared for some eye-rolling, but was pleasantly surprised when the crew happily agreed to swap their standard chemicals for vinegar. They told me that vinegar is actually preferred for wood floors since it doesn’t leave a build-up like chemical products.

Nine years ago this coming June, our whole world changed. That summer, the company that my husband worked for closed it’s doors without any notice. Since my husband was a contractor, we did not qualify for unemployment. We went on WIC for one month just to help out during this time. During our meeting with the WIC nurses, they did a routine finger stick on both of my sons for lead levels. The next week, I received a call from Mike Prideaux of the Black Hawk County Health Department, telling me that my three year old son had lead poisoning. Sean’s blood lead level was 24—over twice the allowed level—and subsequently he needed to have a venous blood test to confirm it.

A few days later, I received another alarming phone call from the health department. Sean’s venous blood lead level was not 24 as the finger stick had shown, but was actually 40 – four times the allowed limit at that time! Sean had to start having routine blood work until he reached a blood lead level under 10 in back to back tests. I thought this might only take a few months, but little did I know it would take a total of four years.

The connection between unhealthy housing and neighborhood violence has been a long standing interest of mine.  Recenty, it became personal.