Anthrax in old ceilings...

[Anonymous]

Right, so having had half the front room ceiling collapse on us, we set to work tidying it up and preparing the other half for the overhaul that it will require.
The removal of the old laths, the old remaining plaster too about 2 hours. The tidying up and cleaning the 300 years of god knows what took about 6 hours to complete.
My wife has just advised me that her colleague who works in a surveying department of a largish estate agency, helpful advised her that we should be careful as there could be anthrax in the ceiling....

I advised her that we'd be protected by the fumes from the lead paint or the asbestos dust, so not to worry !!! I'd never heard of this before, has anyone else come across this ?

Is there an easy way to test for it (that doesn't involve someone keeling over?)

Paul.

 

[Flyfisher]

I'd never heard of the risk of Anthrax until we had someone from English Heritage visit and he mentioned it as we showed him around our very dusty attic and also one of the bedrooms where half the ceiling collapsed some years ago (yes, yes, it's on the list!) and revealing that the six inches or so between the ceiling laths and the attic floor was chock full of various detritus including hundreds of walnut and hazel nut shells, as well as the animal hair in the lime plaster itself, so goodness knows what was up there! However, I'm pretty sure that none of the previous owners back to 1929 died of Anthrax so I'm not losing any sleep over it.

As ever, Google is our friend and this is the 'elf n safety take on it:
http://www.hse.gov.uk/construction/healthrisks/hazardous-substances/harmful-micro-organisms/anthrax.htm

No doubt a bit more searching would find specialist companies willing to take your money and test for Anthrax spores in any material you care to provide, though goodness knows what the sampling strategy for haired plaster should be because how could you be sure that all the hair came from the same animal, infected or not?

According to this, inhalation is the very worst way to contract Anthrax http://www.mayoclinic.org/diseases-conditions/anthrax/symptoms-causes/syc-20356203, so wearing a good mask (eg PPPE3 rating) is probably a good idea - but then, wearing a good mask is generally good advice for any dusty building work.

 

[mardinor]

I suggest that Anthrax in old buildings poses a much lesser risk than infection by Taupe which seems to be rife in new builds..:apparently that just sucks all colour out of life.

 

[CliffordPope]

I suggest that Anthrax in old buildings poses a much lesser risk than infection by Taupe which seems to be rife in new builds..:apparently that just sucks all colour out of life.

You see it in slightly older decoration too, faded to a kind of magnolia. It induces ennui in visitors, although the inhabitants are strangely immune to its effects.

 

[Socksitis]

I believe that this is the reason e have to use imported hair from China, because of the risk of Anthrax. I thought the first sign and possibly the last sign of Anthrax is death?

 

[TheForge]

Are Chinese animals immune to anthrax?

 

[Abi Cott]

Anthrax does live for a long time. There is a car park in Worcester which isn't in a particularly sensible location, but will probably forever remain a car park because it is sited on the old Workhouse graveyard. With Worcester being a major carpet production area. Wool Sorters pneumonia was a common ailment in the working classes.

I lived locally when they changed the road structure in the area. The road still does a weird loop because excavating a portion of the graveyard was deemed too expensive. Archaeologists don't dig known anthrax sites without very good h+s standards, and that doesn't come cheap.

 

[livias]

Anthrax is not a big issue in renovating old buildings. Wear a good mask and be more worried about getting hit by a car as you load the old plaster into the skip.

The reason hair comes from China these days was the BSE scare. However the reason that imported hair is heat treated is to kill Anthrax. Heat treatment of hair strips off the lanolin coating and makes it vulnerable to being 'eaten' by the lime. So don't use animal hair, use synthetic fibre instead.

 

[Chris-Burgess]

. I would not worry about anthrax, I've worked with 100s of plasterers over the years and never heard of one case. The worst thing about animal hair was getting bitten by fleas when you opened the sack from the knackers yard.

 

[Spoilt Victorian Child]

I did a bit of (google) research on this when I found horsehair in plaster at my old place.

The facts I walked away with were:

* Controls were put in place in 1895, so only plaster from before that is potentially risky.

* So few people have died of it, you'd have to be really, really unlucky to be affected. The English Heritage report below from 2001 said there had been 'four reported cases in the last 10 years, and only 2 confirmed since 1995'.

https://horsfallsangels.wikispaces.com/file/view/Cathedral10.pdf

But yes, wear a good FFP3 mask anyway. And don't forget asbestos can be hiding in modern finishings (like artex) as it wasn't banned until 1999.

Why was the original advice restricted to ceilings BTW? Seems a bit odd.