Mold is sneaky. It could be hiding in areas of your home that collect moisture, and you may not even realize it’s there. It could also be causing cold and allergy-like symptoms to develop in your body that you might be blaming on the weather or the time of year.
It’s important to check your living space frequently to ensure mold is not building a home of its own. It’s also important to take precautionary measures to prevent the buildup of mold in your homes. By letting mold accumulate, it can have some distinct effects on your health.
- Mold-Sensitive: Not everyone is sensitive to the effects of mold. For those people who are, mold can cause health symptoms that are parallel to allergies. Sneezing, coughing, wheezing, itchy eyes, stuffy noses, and even skin irritation can occur as a result of mold in your home. Sometimes depending on the time of year, these symptoms can be confused with allergies. People self-diagnose and and decide that their health is acting up because of allergies, ultimately assuming that there is no cure. Before drawing conclusions, check out your living space for mold growth and see if there’s a way to improve your health rather than letting the symptoms go on.
- Mold-Allergic: While there are people who are merely sensitive to mold, there are others who are actually allergic to it. The symptoms that these people experience can be much more severe. These symptoms include chronic lung illnesses and lung infections. Instead of a routine check up on the home, these people should be extra careful of what they’re exposing themselves to. Too much exposure could cause health issues that far surpass allergy symptoms and affect their lungs and breathing for years to come.
- Asthma: There is no evidence supporting that mold can cause asthma in people who did not have it before; however, there has been evidence linked to asthma worsening as a result of extended exposure to mold by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. Utilizing mold prevention can greatly improve the chances of your asthma growing more severe.