‘Meth lab home problem’ sickens new owners - NYT

[maseman]

WINCHESTER, Tenn. - The spacious home where the newly wed Rhonda and Jason Holt began their family in 2005 was plagued by mysterious illnesses. The Holts’ three babies were ghostlike and listless, with breathing problems that called for respirators, repeated trips to the emergency room and, for the middle child, Anna, the heaviest dose of steroids a toddler can take.

Ms. Holt, a nurse, developed migraines. She and her husband, a factory worker, had kidney ailments.

(snip)

It was not until February, more than five years after they moved in, that the couple discovered the root of their troubles: their house, across the road from a cornfield in this town some 70 miles south of Nashville, was contaminated with high levels of methamphetamine left by the previous occupant, who had been dragged from the attic by the police.

http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/31901354/ns/us_news-the_new_york_times

[Phoebe Loosinhouse]

1. Someone should develop a simple home testing kit like radon detectors

that home buyers can place in a home and make their purchase agreements subject to an acceptable reading. Home inspectors should also look into making this a part of their services.

[Stevenmarc]

3. Well unless you are moving to Wasilla the chances your home was a Meth lab are nil.

I can't see a real market for home meth lab testing, however, I find it hard to believe the listing agent didn't know the history of the house.

[izquierdista]

8. You are oblivious to the epidemic

Wasilla is not anomalous, it is typical of the situation in redneck America. The meth epidemic is everywhere, and in their drug induced paranoia to find a place to cook their drug away from the eyes of the law, addicts are polluting houses, hotel rooms, vacant buildings, trailers, storage sheds, garages, storage facilities, and more. Time and a good soaking rain will do much to clean up these messes, but in the short term, addicts who violate every chemical safety rule will continue to pollute.

[Stevenmarc]

9. Yet another good reason not to move to

"redneck America". But getting back on the track that you strayed off of, my comment addressed the development of a test strictly from an economic standpoint. If it were technically possible to develop such a test you would need a market for it that covers the cost of development, production and perceived need for it, so unless your future home had a 1 in 10 shot of being a meth lab it would be a hard sell to tack yet another charge to the cost of buying a home especially when it would be far easier to divulge that information in a title search.

[izquierdista]

11. Training the home inspectors

Most home transactions today take place with someone knowledgeable in construction doing a home inspection for anywhere from $100-300. It would be a simple matter to train these inspectors what to look for as signs of meth cooking. For example, an extra air vent and exhaust fan installed in an unusual place, like a closet or basement (to take care of the fumes).

[Iggo]

18. Southern California is redneck America?

We got meth labs up the wazoo here.

[Stevenmarc]

20. I guess you missed

the quotes around "redneck America"

[Iggo]

21. So? What do the quotes mean?

[Stevenmarc]

22. So you

don't understand basic punctuation marks, let me simplify it for you. A person uses quotation marks around text that someone else has typed, it is the other persons thought or idea. Any intelligent person that comprehends the concept of quotation marks would work their way back in the thread and take that objection up with the person that originally said it.

[Iggo]

23. Never mind.

I found it.

Next time don't be such a fucking dick about it.

[Quantess]

25. Meth labs have been raided in just about every city in America.

Not just in "redneck America". Where have you been, Rip Van Winkle?

[Stevenmarc]

26. Another one

who doesn't get the concept of quotation marks, if you have a problem with the term "redneck America" take it up with the person up the thread I quoted.

[LynneSin]

12. Wow, I can't believe the lack of information in your post

What you don't realize is that there are thousands of Wasilla's across the nation. Small towns plagued with growing meth problems. And if you happen to be a serious meth addict, eventually you'll resort to making your own Meth to keep up with your habit and perhaps make a few dollars on the side.

The scary thing is, it's not that difficult to put a meth lab together. Steal some fertilizer, basic household chemicals and shoplift some cold meds (although keeping the meds behind the counter has helped curb this problem). These meth labs are toxic pits that can turn a normal home into a superfund clean-up site.

Fortunately I own a row-home in the city, so it's much more difficult to create Meth at a home lab. The stench would be too noticible to neighbors.

[Stevenmarc]

16. That's because

you totally missed the point of my post. My post was addressing the marketability of a test, that quite frankly is unnecessary considering there are better ways to divulge that information, it was in no way meant to inform people of the meth epidemic. However, whenever meth is mentioned it's really hard not to put a dig into Palin, sorry you were unable to see the obvious.

[LynneSin]

17. If I lived in the rural part of the united states and bought a home

Especially if I was buying a foreclosed home - I'd pay for the test. Did you read the article? Clean-up can run $30k-$100k a home. One of the homes mentioned was so bad that it was considered uninhabitiable.

Trust me, I'd spend the money for the test. I'd rather know before I bought then to buy and be stuck with a home I can't use and/or sell.

[Stevenmarc]

19. Well good

that's one sale, let me get working on that. However, you can get the same results without the test in a title search or a competent home inspection. You know if I owned a home inspection business in an area ripe with meth labs I would make it my business to market my expertise in sniffing out meth labs, so to speak.

[Statistical]

14. Wasilla? Really? Clueless

There are meth labs in every suburb in America.

It is like saying Robbery is only a problem in Chicago or rape is only a problem in Florida.

Meth-heads don't just cook in their own home. Hotel rooms are used as are foreclosed properties.

[izquierdista]

4. Very difficult

Radon is a radioactive gas, so very easy to build a detection instrument. Meth is a solid, so its concentration will vary; it could be high where it was spilled on the carpet and absent 3 feet away on a wall. Another problem is that meth labs are not just contaminated with the final product, but with solvents and other chemicals used in the manufacture: iodine, red phosphorous, ammonia, etc. Even a trained chemist will miss the tell tale signs of a former meth lab unless he is looking very specifically for them.

[fujiyama]

2. God talk about shitty luck:

“It makes you crazy,” Ms. Rodriguez said. “Our credit is ruined, we won’t be able to buy another house, somebody exposed my kids to meth, and my dog died.”

[KharmaTrain]

5. And In Other News...Walgreens Opens Up Their First Alaskan Pharamcy

In Wasilla. Guess they'll be doing a land office business selling Sudafed there.

[LynneSin]

13. Walgreen keeps all that stuff behind the counter

They limit how much you can buy and keep records of what you bought.

[KharmaTrain]

15. And cheney kept us safe...

I just found the location in the Meth Capital of the US quite interesting.

Nothing against Wallgreens...heck, I'm a stockholder in the company.

:hi:

[Phoebe Loosinhouse]

6. I also read an article that said some meth makers were highly mobile and using hotels/motels

as temporary labs. That's a definite concern for that industry if they suddenly found a whole bunch of contaminated rooms.

[WeDidIt]

7. Should be a required disclosure on the title search

If drug offenders were ever arrested in the home, it should eb disclosed in the title search. Other defects in the home must be disclosed in most states.

This includes cannabis cultivation as the high levels of moisture can cause mold problems in homes.

[Berry Cool]

10. That makes a lot of sense. n/t

[Flaneur]

24. Another unintended consequence of drug prohibtion.

If the tweakers could buy this stuff at the store, they wouldn't be cooking it up everywhere.

Making meth is no more inherently dangerous than any other chemical process--if done properly. But somebody who's been buzzing for four days straight might make a mistake or be less than scrupulous about environmental concerns.

I know there will be a bunch of people pointing out how horrible and poisonous meth is, and I don't deny the deleterious consequences of getting strung out on it. But it's not poison; it's a Schedule II controlled substance, marketed under the brand name Desoxyn and part of the same amphetamine family as Ritalin and Adderall.

Maybe we'd be better off just legalizing it. We would have the negative consequences of abuse for some users--just as we have now under prohibition--but not the negative consequences of prohibition: contamination, loss of access to Sudafed for the rest of us, black market criminality...