Concern about dust from renovation.

[Rich Heimlich]

I'm having hardwood floors put in throughout the first floor of my home and I'm doing the demolition. Our house was built in 1977 and had plywood put on the subfloor with vinyl sheeting in the kitchen and foyer. Later, but no telling how far later, a previous owner laid another layer of plywood (very thin) then stapled metal mesh screening to it and poured some sort of cement on top of which they laid 1/4" tile.

Upon tearing all this up (the kitchen actually has 4 different floors on it) I didn't initial wear a mask and then realized the dust was very heavy. Now, of course, I have something stuck in my throat today that has me trying to cough it up. I'l be wearing a mask from here on in until I finish but now I'm wondering if all I may have ingested is basically sand (cement) or if that material might include more harmful ingredients like asbestos. I can't imagine that circa 1980 or later that anyone would use asbestos in cement but perhaps as an insulator it might have been done. What I'm asking is, what are the odds of something harmful versus having just ingested standard cement dust (not that it's good for you)?

[R Doornbosch]

relax take a few shots of whiskey and email us in the morning. If not we'll assume it was harmful.

[m Ransley]

relax,and take a few more shots of whiskey for me. You will be ok.

[EL]

Make sure it's single malt Scotch. What will you do differently if someone tells you it was pure asbestos? What's done is done. Just don't keep doing it.

Boden

m Ransley wrote:

[Jimm6y Dean]

Well, just read cement packages that tell you not to breathe the cement dust. Perhaps you could do a google search for the material safety data sheets on some cements to see what you're up against.

When I had a job working with hundreds of different chemicals I learned quickly to always know the materials and always wear safety gear. And you have just discovered why too.

If you're healthy you'll likely be fine, but how many times can you get away with being careless? Lungs have lots of excess capacity and can take a beating for years, until you start losing capacity with age and need what might have been squandered.

[norminn]

Drink lots of fluids so you can produce the juice it takes to cough up irritants. Ever play baseball? Slide into home? One dose of dust probably didn't do you any harm. If you cough up blood, see a doc.