Is Your Drywall A Rotting Health Hazard?

(CBS)  A growing number of Americans are facing a calamity that comes, literally, from within the walls of their homes.
It's estimated that as many as 60,000 houses nationwide, primarily in Southern states and California, were built using contaminated drywall -- also known as wallboard -- in the last several years. That drywall is now beginning to rot.

On The Early Show Friday, home improvement expert Danny Lipford explained that the building boom appears to have been at least partly to blame.

"Everything was so busy back in '03 and '04," he told co-anchor Harry Smith, "they just couldn't keep up with the production of regular drywall. ... They had to start bringing it in from China. That's when the problem started."

On The CBS Evening News Thursday, chief investigative correspondent Armen Keteyian reported that, " chief investigative correspondent Armen Keteyian, " Normally, drywall is made purely from the stone-like mineral gypsum. ... But health officials now suspect at least some of the Chinese product was contaminated with dangerous chemicals, chemicals that have not only damaged homes, but also raise unknown health risks."

Acceptable drywall and the suspicious kind are identical. So how can you that the stuff inside your home's walls may be defective?

"(Odor) is one of the ways you can tell if you have a problem," Lipford says. "If your house stays closed up and you open the doors and you smell that rotten egg smell, you may have a problem with it. ... Sulfur given off by that is creating that smell."

Why is that a problem?

"It's very corrosive to copper," Lipford says. "You have so much copper in your house. Life your refrigerator coil (behind it). And in the air conditioning, electrical service, all of that. When you look at (the copper in those visible places in your house)), it should be a copper color. If it's a dark color, then you may have a problem with the sulfur given off by the drywall."

In addition, the only way to test to see if your drywall is problematic, Lipford says, "is to take a small piece to a lab and see if the sulfur content that's in the drywall is higher than it should be for indoor use like that. And that's when you can really tell."

What's more, "Sometimes you'll see 'Made in China' stamped in it. But I've heard that some of the bulks of the drywall will have 'Made in the U.S.' and 'Made in China' on the same bulk."

It gets worse.

"If you do have the stuff in your house, Lipford continued, "Unfortunately, there's not much you can do. You can't encapsulate it with paint or anything like that. You have to remove every bit of drywall and then start looking at the things that have been corroded. Those have to be removed too. It's not a good situation."

Also, Lipford points out, "Most insurance companies are denying any coverage on this."

And so, he noted, "Class action suits are popping up all everywhere all over the country right now."

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For much more on this, from Lipford, click here.

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[cassidy75]

Why are we sending all our jobs to China again...I thought it was to bring down the price of products...that is a joke!! CEO's are getting rich and we are paying higher prices. How about some protectionism? We want quality jobs and products!

[mabowen55]

Contrary to what the expert in this interview said, there is an alternative way of dealing with this drywall problem. It has been tested in an independent lab and has been confirmed to work and the product is a green product and carries a warranty. The firm is based out of North Carolina. The product is named Cleanseal and their website is: www.cleansealep.com

[mallorycole]

There is NOT an alternative way to deal with this. They aren't even done testing what exactly all the different chemicals do. There's no way this company is ahead of the game. They just want MONEY!

[caco58]

I told my boss the drywall we were hanging was junk, because of the way it was breaking when you cut it. Real good board breaks clean, no jagged edges to rasp off. It even smelled different. I had no idea it was this bad. You get what you pay for, again. Build, build, build they said. Now you have big, big, problems.

[rational_1]

Well I guess we don't have to worry about China as a superpower. If the quality of their military equipment is on par with the rest of the cr*p they produce, they're about as dangerous as a kitten. Personally I'm avoiding as much as possible anything that has "made in China" stamped on it. I used to think it was generally second-rate but I've now downgraded their products to garbage.

[erasmus111]

So ok, first it's poisoned pet food, lead in children's toys, our food is contaminated, baby formula poisoned, and now this with the drywall. Did I leave anything out?

How long are we going to put up with this cr*p?

Isn't it time to do something about China?

[cassidy75]

You forgot about poisoning our toothpaste!

[erasmus111]

Notice CBS has deleted all the earlier comments.

Posted by trillion1 at 3:09 PM : Mar 27, 2009

They could show up again later.

I looked back on some posts I had made on another article, and there was a lot of mine, and others missing. I couldn't understand why they would have been deleted. I went back again a few hours later, and they were all back again. Things are sure screwy.

[Meg003]

We had to rebuild a large portion of our house during 2004 and 2005 after storms from the inland remnants of Hurricane Ivan tore it apart, though we live hundreds of miles from the coast. Maybe we were lucky, though, because I have never smelled a sulfur odor. Still, I'd like to know for sure.

[jd2408]

This should be on the front page news. It will not be and will be covered up because Corporate America will make sure of it. How can they stamp USA on something made in China. When will our government ever care enough about us to act on China's junk and contaminated products. If it turns copper black what is it doing to humans ?

[trillion1]

Notice CBS has deleted all the earlier comments.

[JEC666]

And a half hour later you want to buy another house.