Podcast Transcript
Jason Earle
00:00
We just heard about all of the issues that Bonnie was dealing with. And coming back on the show to talk so much more about this is Jason Earle. He is an indoor air quality Crusader. He is also the founder and CEO of one 800 Got mold, as well as MiCollab, USA, and he is the creator of the got Mold Test Kit. Jason, I am so excited to have you back. Welcome back to thyroid Mystery Solved hypothyroid and Hashimotos revealed,
Jason Earle 00:29
it’s so good to be here. Thanks for having me.
00:31
So, you know, it’s not news that mold exposure is not healthy for any of us, right. But what a lot of people don’t realize is that specifically for Hashimotos, and other autoimmune diseases as well. But in general, Hashimotos and thyroid issues, molds can really be a big immune trigger. And I know there’s so much that we’re going to unpack about this today. But just to make sure that everyone’s on the same page. When we think about molds, you know, people think okay, well, I’m not around more, I’m not seeing more, but what are some ways that people can actually be exposed to it because it’s a lot more than people realize?
Jason Earle 01:08
Yeah, no doubt about it. So mold exposure is is somewhat complex, it can be subtle, it can be completely undetectable, quite frankly, especially when you start looking at food, which is underrecognized route of exposure. So most people think about mold in the building is something that you either see or smell, or feel, which is generally what we suggest people do is sort of tune into their senses. And if you see something, smell something or feel something, do something, but the evidence is mounting that we have a real problem with our food supply, especially when it comes to imported grains.
As 2018 study found that 60 to 80% of our imported grains are contaminated with mycotoxins and mycotoxins are the the poisons that molds produce to compete with one another. And so this is happening in more than just our imported grains. It’s also happening with nuts, seeds, spices, and also domestically. It happens anytime food is mishandled, the climate control is not being controlled. And then also when it comes to conventional meat and dairy, because these animals are being fed food they don’t normally eat in nature, right?
They’re being fed grains, which are not human grade. Well, what is it that makes them not human grade, their first will being stored in suboptimal conditions. And then of course, many times they’re already contaminated. And so they don’t make the cut for humans. But we being at the top of the food chain, just like mercury rises through the food chain through little fish to the big fish and then to us, so to do mycotoxins because they are heat resistant. They do not you cannot cook them out. And so they end up in our food supply.
And then they concentrate in us because they’re lipo philic, meaning they get stored in our fat cells. And then they’re also hydrophobic, which means that they don’t excrete well in urine. They don’t they don’t they don’t dissolve into water. So it’s, there’s a lot of factors there that ultimately make mold exposure through food, a really common problem. And that, by the way, happens to be what is mostly showing up in mycotoxin, urine panels, which are very popular these days.
03:09
Yeah. And just for people who may not be familiar, what is a mycotoxin? Urine panel? Can you talk about that a little bit?
Jason Earle 03:15
Sure. It’s one of the only tools that are available right now for functional integrative practitioners. So basically, it’s a urine sample, and they look for the metabolites, or the byproducts of molds digestive process, and also the, the mycotoxins that it produces. So there are actually a few different there’s what’s called oat panels. And then there’s another one called their mycotoxin panels. And so it’s focusing on the mycotoxin panels. They’re gonna, they’re looking for the sort of the primary violators, if you will, and unfortunately, they’re oftentimes that oftentimes triggers a response, which leads to expensive inspections and remediation that may or may not be necessary in the home. And oftentimes, people skip over the most important exposure, which is really their pantry, and restaurants. So this is the real kick in the pants that most people don’t want to hear is that when you’re eating out unless it says organic, it isn’t.
And usually, anything that’s made with the processed grains or processed refined carbohydrates is generally going to have a an international component. And so that’s where we get most of our exposures from in my research and, and in my, in my professional opinion, so that the panels are limited to, to these sort of primary violators. But the other thing that’s important to note is that mycotoxin producing molds account for about 100 species out of 100,000. So what that means is that mold sickness, well, I haven’t let me back up to suggest that though only those 100 molds are what causes all mold related illness, and to the exclusion of 99,900 defies logic. So there’s other other factors when it comes to mold exposure, especially when it comes to our buildings. The mold that grows in our buildings produces lots of other chemicals that don’t show up in these mycotoxin urine panels.
05:07
Okay? That’s very, very helpful to know. Because there are people and depending on for everyone listening, depending on where you are on your journey, you know, some people who maybe have gone the functional medicine route, and maybe have seen providers, and you’re trying to look into your triggers. And if you’re wondering if mold is an issue, you may have had a mycotoxin test done. And as Jason is saying, you know, as helpful as it can be, it’s really only accounting for the small part, and it’s more of the food part even.
And I think it’s so interesting what you’re saying, Jason, we’re gonna get into more of this as we talk today that a lot of times if people have high mycotoxins in that urine panel, it ends up going into, okay, well, where’s the mold exposure? A lot of people don’t think of it from a food perspective. And they say, okay, it must be something in my home. And depending on who then you bring in, that does the inspection and then further remediation, you know, it’s the field is not very regulated. Right. And so, you know, sometimes, you know, you get right in answers, but then other times, you know, there may be walls being opened up and things being looked at. And not to say that that’s not necessarily rare, but in some situations, like you said, if you’re not looking at the food component, which is where a lot of it could be coming from, it can potentially create a lot of unnecessary expenses, right. And excavation, really,
Jason Earle 06:29
yeah, and I should, I should point out that false positives are actually when data is misinterpreted and in a way that it lends itself to like, oh, well, this is you get high my kids oxygen, you’re gonna You must have on your home. That is a conflation. In other words, these are two different ideas being mashed up together, where you’ve got this idea that mold, mold grows in buildings and mold, you know, multidose is mycotoxin. So I’ve got mold in my year. If I’ve got mycotoxins in my urine, I must have mold in my building. That’s really that’s fundamentally not true. But But when your provider suggests that because they may not be aware of the the food exposures, then you end up on a wild goose chase. And so that that I would argue is a combination of sort of like a false positive. If the data is misinterpreted, that it lends, it really ends up being a false positive.
And so you end up going down rabbit holes, it’s important to realize that when it comes to this, you really have to sort of do you have to be your own advocate in many ways. You have to do your own research, listening to podcasts like this is very important. But you know, when it comes down to the mycotoxin exposures, and then people immediately go into an inspection. The other problem is that oftentimes, the provider will recommend an inspector who they work with, that’s very focused on the mycotoxins also. And then they often use a test called ErmI, which stands for environmental relative Moldiness index, and it’s a dust test. It’s actually not a test. It’s a building. It’s a research tool that was developed 20 years ago, by the by an EPA staffer.
And it’s been used by a lot of practitioners, because it seems to have a very high sensitivity. Well, the problem is, is that it actually has way too high of a sensitivity. And it actually was always high. I mean, when I say always, I mean, 95% of the time, it’s high, even in buildings that don’t have any history of water damage. And through my inspection company, I’ve researched, I’ve done it, I’ve been behind hundreds of these high tests, high readings, and I’ve been only able to verify conditions in the building that reflected what the test found and about 10% of cases. So you end up with the if you jump from data point to data point, and you have a high mycotoxin panel, and then you go into your house and you do an army test. Whoa, you must have a problem because the mycotoxins are high, almost everybody, by the way, is high, almost everybody unless you’ve got detox pathway issues, which is very common also.
But if you have high mycotoxin, reading in your urine, and then you have a high ErmI in your house, that’s enough to scare you into just about anything that leads to really outrageous remediations that are oftentimes unnecessary. So So rewinding that and getting focused on the primary exposure, that that leads to a high urine panel is really, really important because it can save you enormous amounts of money, and also peace of mind. So But getting back to, you know, I look at this as mold related illness is really about air, food and attitude. You know, you can’t really get better until you believe you can get better. So that’s where the attitude piece comes in. But you can’t look at mold exclusively with buildings. Although building related mold is a major issue. When it comes to thyroid, you have to look at them. In total, you have to look at the whole package. We’ll talk
09:31
about building mold in a second. But just going back to food, what you’re saying is that it’s the international grains and things that aren’t organic, and then the conventionally produced dairy and meat. So what recommendations do you have for people who may have high mycotoxins or suspect there could be an issue and they want to look at the food? Do you recommend them that they go grain free? Or is it changing the types of grains they eat?
Jason Earle 09:58
Yes, yeah, no good. Great. Well, So it’s a no sugar, no grains diet. So it looks a lot like keto, but with also a focus on making sure that any of the meats and dairy that you that you consume is organic, local grass fed, pastured, etc. So, so really, it becomes sort of a, it’s a whole foods diet, a true whole foods diet, the you know, the organic part when it comes to veggies and stuff like that. It’s important for lots of other reasons, right? Like, you don’t need to worry about mold when it comes to that stuff. But it ends up being you’re also going to avoid things like peanut butter. And applesauce unless you make your own tomato sauce.
Even if you think about the way these tomatoes and apples are selected for sauces, they’re probably the ugliest, you know, they’re probably already out on their way out. And there’s no way they’re carving out all the nasty parts before they throw that in the bin, which sits there for a few more days before it gets processed. So you have to eliminate these kinds of obvious sources. Also, cured meats, that tend to be a problem, because the curing process often involves spices that can be contaminated coming from developing countries.
So cleaning up your diet has to do with, you know, just being very aware of the fact that anything that’s been stored for any length of time, anything that comes in a box, a bag, anything that’s a process, like a powder, where the point of origination is a question mark, these are the things that you want to avoid. And then of course, you know, like I said, restaurants are a major problem. And so you know, if, unless you’re eating, when you’re eating out, you have to make sure that you’re eating, you know, organic, local grass-fed.
And that means the burger, the burger might be fine, but the bun might not pay. And so you know, it is it is a challenge. For those of you who eat keto already, and who’ve been through this adjustment phase, it will require you taking it up a notch, which means that you then go to the you know, like I said, local seasonal grass-fed pastured meats and dairy, which is, which is crucial, because, again, the dairy, you know, you’re passing less stuff through in the fats. And so all that stuff comes comes through beautifully, and then we retain it.
And that’s really where I think a lot of this is coming from, you know, mold in food, and mold in air if you happen to have the double whammy, as many of us do. If you’ve got a prime in your house, and we’re all eating the same kind of stuff, we’re all eating from the same trough, if you will, no pun intended, you know, when you when you look at the way these things potentially amplify each other. It’s no wonder that, you know, people refer to mold as sort of like kryptonite, right, because you’re getting mycotoxins tend to operate mostly on organ systems. And then indoor air quality related exposures tend to affect you more on a cognitive basis, brain fog, emotional dysregulation, fatigue, things like that. And so oftentimes, people present with both symptoms, you know, gut related issues, organ related issues, and then also the cognitive stuff.
And then, of course, you know, that also presents in many cases, as you know, surfacing of autoimmune diseases, like the ones we’re talking about today.
12:57
Do you feel that if someone let’s say, is maybe just starting their journey, and they’re worried about mycotoxins and exposure to food, and they eliminate the grains, and they eliminate all of the things that can have mycotoxins in them? And as they do that, they then work on their detox pathways, and they support their methylation and they do all of the things as they go through their journey? Do you think that they would, at some point be able to handle some of those grains because of the detox pathways or working with their body can process it? Or is it something where everyone has their own thresholds?
Jason Earle 13:30
I think it’s a very personal thing. I think all of these things are so bio individual, you know, a lot of times people say that they just feel better eating that way anyway. And once you’ve sort of gotten your diet clean, you know, it becomes less and less appealing. Also, you start to you start you, you start to wade back into those waters. And you start to go away, why can I do that? You know, like, I don’t feel good. It was like a moment on my lips, you know, forever on my hips, kind of an idea, like, Why did I do that?
And so I think that what I encourage people to do is, trust your intuition on these things, you know, for first, first go through the hard part, which is adjusting to a different lifestyle, and I do think it’s a lifestyle, and then it’s more of an 8020 or 9010 kind of thing. Because I think, what, what people don’t realize about the detox pathways, and I’m no expert in this, but I’ve been doing this for 21 years, and I’ve done 1000s and 1000s of cases. So you know, anecdotally speaking, you know, what I find is that the people who have you know, this genetics are not hardwired, right? But we know these are malleable switches and so like the epigenetics part here should not be overlooked when people say, Oh, I’ve got this this mutation.
I’ve got my detox pad. I don’t I don’t detox Well, well, you may have made up your mind about that, but your body hasn’t. And so you there are things that you can and should do and one of the best ways to do is stop talking. The first step in detoxing is to stop toxic Yes. 100% You know, the body is like an amazing juggler. It can It can maintain these incredible processes with beauty and elegance in 1000s of processes all at once. And mold is like a guy across the room throwing baseballs at him, you know, like, he’s gonna have to make a decision here. Am I going to keep juggling these processes? Or am I going to defend myself from this evolutionary threat, which is what mold is. And I’m here to tell you that that’s moldy, the juggler will drop a lot of balls to protect itself from this very, very acute, serious threat.
And then as sometimes has a hard time getting those balls back up and processing efficiently, so you have to give it time to allow those pathways that may be opened up with the help of a practitioner. But sometimes, oftentimes, I’ve seen people who just do the right thing on the detox on the stop toxic part, right, just stop the threat, right, stop, stop overloading it with air and food exposures, and then suddenly have symptoms start abating. And then and then and then next thing you know, they test they find that they’ve got lots of mycotoxins in their urine and guess what that means you’re excreting them. That’s a good thing.
Not a bad thing. If you’ve changed your diet and your building is clean, and you’re and you’re actually excreted, you actually have higher panels. That’s actually a good indication, right? Some people will test in the low panels, and they’ll find that they’re still feeling lousy. And it’s because they’re not excreting and then they go through the process of actually stopping the detox is stopping detoxification process, right cleaning up their diet in their in their building, and they’re excreting more and they panic, I must have had an exposure, no, you’re finally releasing these things. Right? There’s a lot of counterintuitive perspective on this that needs to be maintained. And unfortunately, this often comes from the practitioners to the panic when they see a high panel, you know,
16:38
yeah, sometimes they’re not reading it correctly. And this is something we see all the time with heavy metals to especially looking at things in, say, like a hair test, you know, we don’t see a lot, we start to detox, we see Mercury come out, I always tell people, that’s good. That means you had it all along, it’s just coming out, you didn’t just happen to get mercury in the last three months out of nowhere, you know, same
Jason Earle 16:57
kind of thing. So, so really, it is it is a matter of I think sometimes allowing, having a little bit of patience, which is hard in our society, we all want a pill or potion or powder that’s going to immediately you know, fix this thing. And my experience has been that a little bit of patience goes a long way, getting this stuff cleaned up getting the your external exposures cleaned up, and then allowing your body to do its thing and loving your liver. And you know, like drinking clean water and sweating and you know, all those things, getting plenty of sunlight.
And you know, supplementing where appropriate for the basic things that are important that vitamin D, and you know, the stuff that the micronutrients, and getting those things in place, and maintaining those things in place, will give your body permission to do what it normally does really, really well, right. And oftentimes you don’t need a protocol, you don’t need a push. But for the people who don’t get better, after they’ve done that for a while, 3060 90 days, then you know, lean into maybe getting a little bit of help and, and getting a little bit of a push. But I really do think that most of the time, this stuff does take care of itself if you take care of the basic parts, which are within your control.
18:07
And that makes so much sense on the diet front of things and the mycotoxins in food. What about the environment, right? The House, The School, the office building, because there’s so much confusion here. And you already mentioned in terms of the Army’s test showing things being high when they aren’t really high. So one of the things I know you talk about is that mold is really a moisture problem. So can you talk a little bit more about that? And how someone could maybe think about if maybe they have exposure in their environment, in addition to everything that’s going on with their diet? Sure,
Jason Earle 18:41
yeah. So mold is always a mold problem is always a moisture problem. Always the spores, that mold produce are like the microscopic seeds that are the basis for all growth, but they will remain a spores indefinitely until there’s until the right conditions are present that allow the growth to occur. So at the end of the day, mold control is about moisture control. Now, buildings, by definition, fail in one of two ways they fail to shed wind or water, and oftentimes both at the same time. So there’s a constant onslaught by nature to basically get, you know, elements into our buildings.
And so they inevitably because of maintenance issues, or you know, natural disasters and things like that, water gets in. And then also we also generate moisture within our building through you know, cleaning and bathing and, and, and breathing, and all that stuff. And if that moisture isn’t controlled well for exhaust vents, and and dehumidification and things like that it will manifest as a mold problem. So there’s lots of different ways that mold can mold can develop in a building. It’s not just always from a leak or a flood. So the key is that when people ask me what the best Mold Test is, and we sell a Mold Test, of course, but but I always say that you’re the best mold test you are are an exquisite integrated array of precision sensors. That’s what the human human body is.
And so learning to tune in, like I said earlier about even about the food, and learning to tune into your own innate sense of what’s right and wrong. And learning to trust that is a big step towards being able to live happy and healthy way and modern buildings. And so if you see something, meaning looking for moisture issues, any signs of dampness, so blistering paint, stains, discoloration, Trump pulling away from walls, things like that, you may have a problem. If you smell something the musty smell is often the first clue. But it’s also a health hazard.
Reason animal studies have shown that the musty smell is actually neurotoxic. And what that means and by the way, all molds produce the musty smell during active growth, which means that all mold growth of significance can lead to toxicity regardless of whether or not it produces mycotoxins This is a very important point. Animal studies show that the fruit flies in fact stop producing dopamine, they start flying down instead of the light. They they develop Parkinsonian like symptoms, locomotor dysfunction and mitochondrial damage. And so that’s just this exposure to one of the compounds commonly found in actively growing mold. So the musty smell is a big deal on it. And it’s and it’s the, it’s the, like I said, it’s often the first clue.
So if you smell that musty smell, run towards that, find the moisture source and fix that. That’s the first step. So if you see something, smell something, it feels something rather, that feels something is really important. So if you feel something, that means that particular particular symptom that seems to get better when you leave the building, this is a really common thing, where and unfortunately, by the way, a lot of people don’t leave the building because they feel so lousy, and they’re staying in the very thing that makes him sick. So it’s this part of this, this negative loop. But, but oftentimes, if it’s a it’s a good test to go somewhere for a week, now everybody feels better when they’re on vacation. But it’s often it’s often a really helpful to get a little bit of space from your building.
And even if that means just an afternoon walk, a lot of times people will feel that their brain fog will lift, their energy will get better. And it can be oftentimes in a matter of hours, usually in a couple of days is a better measure, and obviously a week or longer will give you some time to really process these things. You know, just like with other talks with, with intoxicants, and you have to think about the mold VOCs, as well as VOCs from the manmade materials, like the ones that are buildings or mana VOCs or volatile organic compounds. And many of them are carcinogenic, and and have other other very serious ramifications. But you know, one of the most popular VOCs is alcohol. And so, so when you think about how long it takes you to feel better after you’ve had a night out, that maybe you know went a little bit longer than you might have planned. That takes a few days.
Right, it really for you to completely get straight. It’s not the next day, it’s really two three days before you’re actually clear again. And so when we’re talking about VOCs through inhalation, it’s no different, your body still needs a few days to process these things. And the primary exposure when it comes to mold growth is the actual musty smell because it disseminates into the air unlike the spores and the mycotoxins which which are are not distributed in the air evenly, the VOCs can be much more evenly distributed, which means that your exposure to them in every breath is is is much more likely.
And I should also mention we breathe 13 to 15 times a minute, which comes out to 20,000 times a day. And we spend 90% of our time indoors, often these days post COVID in the same building, breathing 20,000 times a day. So unless your air is pristine, what you’re what you’re really doing is you’re taking 20,000 doses of an unhealthy substrate, right. And so, so getting this clean is is of the utmost importance, not just for autoimmune disease, but I would say for general health and longevity.
24:07
So let’s talk about how to get that clean. So first, how do we find out if there’s anything there? So you said okay, if there’s a musty smell, you know, there is an issue. So in terms of mold tests out there, and I know they vary, and which is why I’m so excited about your test because of all of the benefits that it has, which I will let you talk about in a second. But if someone smells the musty smell, does it mean that they shouldn’t even bother with the test? Or is it still helpful to do the test? And then the second part of this question is if there’s no musty smell, but maybe they see peeling paint or bubbling pain and things that you mentioned, and you know, does it smell or maybe sometimes people just don’t have a very sensitive nose, that happens often too. So then how, you know, how did they test what’s the best way to see if it’s an issue? Yeah,
Jason Earle 24:54
so I mean, they’re on the DIY side of things on the at home test kit side of things. The real Isn’t that we created our kit was because we had people calling us over. And we had a lot of national press in the beginning, Good Morning America and Extreme Makeover Home Edition and stuff like that. So we had people calling us from all over the country, asking if we could come inspect their house, and they were outside of our coverage area. So a lot of people asked us for a Mold Test Kit that we could recommend and, and we heard that request so often that we began looking to see if we could find something we could recommend it we couldn’t, in good conscience suggest that any one of them would, would would be worth the investment.
And, in particular Urmi army was it was a real problem. And it leads to so many, so much panic, and so much confusion. So, so what we did was we decided to take a professional tool known as a spore trap, which is how most professionals test the air for for mold. And develop a method to collect those samples without having to hire a professional, which is very cost prohibitive, and oftentimes invites someone who might have a conflict of interest into your home. And oftentimes can, you know, use that data against you so to speak, you know, great fear, if they do remediation also, which is not illegal, shockingly.
And in most states, you can do the inspection testing, and then you can turn around and hand someone a quote for remediating the thing that you detected. So that leaves a lot of room for abuse. So we wanted to create a tool that would allow people to safely test their air without any of those concerns. And so that’s what the got Mold Test Kit is about. And so it lets you test up to three rooms in your home using these, these professional methods. And what you get is a beautiful color coded green, yellow, orange red interpretation of the lab data as well as the spores that were found the types and quantities and resources for what to do next in terms of how to find and hire a qualified inspector if you need one, and how to find it, hire a qualified remediator if you need one. So so it’s the idea here is that it doesn’t replace a professional inspection.
Because there’s a lot of conditions that are present in a building that would be helpful for the diagnosis of the underlying moisture problem that cannot be detected with a test kit, right. So we equate this to a pregnancy test kit in the sense that you wouldn’t start buying baby furniture just because it’s as positive. The next step is you go to the doctor. So so this is a really a cost effective way for people to initially screen their home for a potential mold issue. And if you can nice, the nice thing about it is each sample only takes five minutes.
So if you do three rooms, plus the outside sample, 20 minutes worth the testing, and guess what the pumps doing all the work for you, all you have to do is open it up, put the cassettes on, put them back into Bertrand mailer, and drop it in the mail makes it super easy, super easy. Yeah. And they started 199 clues, lab fees, shipping both ways. So it’s turnkey, we even send fresh brand new batteries with it. So you can test right away. So it’s 199 249 and 299 for one, two, and three room kits. And then once you have the pump, the air sampling pump, which enables the whole thing, you can then buy refills for $50 less.
So it’s only 149 for a one room kit, 199 and 249. So really affordable, cost effective first step. And so you know the plays well with the idea that if you see something, smell something or feel something, because sometimes you might find that there’s mold, there’s two kinds of mold growth, really, there’s mold on a wall and well then a wall mold in a wall, the spore counts might be normal, so our kit might show not detected. But there’s a musty smell. And there’s visible water damage and things like that. That’s very important. Because now you know that the mold is in the wall doesn’t mean you’re not going to get exposed to it because the musty smell is really a causal is a causal factor here. It’s a major irritant and aggravator.
But it helps you characterize the nature of the mold problem. And that’s the most important part is figuring out where the moisture is coming from. And then to what extent you have a mold problem. And then from there, you can determine whether or not you need professional assistance, and our kit helps you narrow that down to a simpler decision. And then we also offer in complement to the kit, we also have developed an ebook called How to find mold, which is really helpful for people that are early in their mold awareness journey. And it gives you inspection checklists, and FAQs. And it really walks you through your home.
So that before you go and spend 1000 or $2,000 for a professional inspector, you be your own inspector and collect your own samples and get to know your building a little bit more, you know, that the the your building is an extension of your immune system, much like an echo skin or an exoskeleton and and to ignore that is is to ignore a critical part of your overall health and well being. Yeah,
29:32
absolutely. And we’re gonna post links in the show notes to the ebook and the test kit as well. Jason, what about air purification? So let’s say someone is in the process of looking at it or maybe you know, they’re about to start to do the tests or maybe they’re even in like the middle of the remediation phase. Does it help to have a good air purifier or is there anything else in terms of like, just the way As the air moves like through, that could be helpful.
Jason Earle 30:03
Yeah. So when it comes to an indoor air quality problem, no matter what kind, whether it’s, you know, mold or VOCs, any indoor air quality problem, there’s only three things you can do, you can remove the source. And that’s not always possible practical when you’re dealing with like, vocs. If it’s from like a newly finished hardwood floor, what are you going to do right? Or, or a mold problem, that’s maybe a little too much right now for the budget to fully remediate, right, you may have to borrow money, maybe you’re renting, and you don’t even have the ability to do anything about it.
So in those cases, source control is not possible. The other thing you can do is you can filter the air and filtering the air you the key is you have to have the right kind of filter, because most indoor air quality problems come not just as particles, which is what HEPA filters removed, but also as gases like the VOCs. And so HEPA filters only take up particles and the gases pass right through. So you need a carbon element, or you need a carbon filter within the air cleaner to be able to capture those gases. That’s unfortunately a weakness in most air cleaning units. And even the ones that have carbon have too little.
So they the the they get saturated fairly quickly. Is there one you recommend? Yeah, you know, I go back and forth on this quite a bit. There’s, there’s, there’s the on the high end, okay. There’s a company called IQ err, that makes a really great unit. It’s called the Health Pro Plus. And I often hesitate to recommend them because the company has changed so much recently, but the PILT, the filter is great. And so so that they’re about 1000 bucks, Austin Air also makes really great units that have a lot of carbon in them. lower end
31:40
direct costs, and air is the Healthmate. Right? Yes,
Jason Earle 31:43
and they felt a lot of glue Did they have a lot of carbon, and that’s that’s key, you know, on the on the lower end, in terms of price, mattify air has some some nice units, they don’t have that much carbon in them. So you have to replace the filters pretty often. But they’re much more affordable. I mean, they have one unit that’s like 80 bucks that can can handle a one bedroom, one bedroom apartment really nicely.
But the bedroom, that’s great to know, but you have to replace the filter. So you have to consider that as part of the overall expense. Because if you’re not replacing the filters, you might as well not have one. So the VOCs fell, HEPA filters still work, even if they’re not replaced, they just wear out the motor a little bit because they kind of get bought, the filter gets a little bit clogged, but the VOC filters, the if the if they get saturated air still passes through them. But the VOCs do too. So So for
32:27
VOCs that is the carbon filter, right? And how often would a carbon filter need to be replaced, in your opinion, you
Jason Earle 32:35
know, it depends on how much how much what the VOC load is in the building. Unfortunately, now IQ air has a really cool feature where the when you replace the VOC filter, you’ll see that has little red beads inside mixed in with the black carbon. If you check periodically, you’ll see that when they become when they when they get black, they’ve actually gotten saturated, so they have a visual indicator. Otherwise, a lot of them just have this sort of like this, this silly payment was like it was run for certain number of hours, you should change it or a certain number of months. And that’s not an accurate represent an accurate representation of exposure to or saturation.
So I would say in most cases, if you’ve got you know, something that’s got a little bit of carbon in it probably every three months or less. And so it really depends on the VSC load. Now, the other thing is it’s hard to test for the VOCs. There’s a company called enthalpy labs, they have a product called home air check, I don’t know if if they sell so direct to consumer. But they do a vo C test. And if you can, I can find out and possibly send you a link for show notes for that as well. Because that would be helpful. Knowing how much you have of something is helpful to determine how much you need to invest in removing it.
33:43
And is it correct to see that molds in addition to mycotoxins also produces VOCs. So the VOCs are coming from the mold? Yes, in addition, right to potentially the hardwood floors and furniture and carpets and whatever else. Yeah, so
Jason Earle 33:58
the VOC volatile organic compounds, and then there’s microbial volatile organic compounds, which is the musty smell. So so really, when you look at air quality, you have to look at the VOCs that come from microbial sources as well as from from manmade sources. So, so we just covered the the source control, removal remediation, that’s one thing you can do. The second thing you can do is air filtration. The third thing you can do and this is the only three things you can do when it comes in air quality problem. The third thing is ventilation, or dilution, which is to bring fresh air in from somewhere else now.
That can be as simple as opening your windows. Now assuming it’s not too hot, too cold or too humid outside that works well. But you know the same reason why opening your you don’t you can’t necessarily use your window and your bathroom as a bathroom exhaust fan, right because seasonally speaking, that’s not a very efficient way to do it. So you have to use a fan well they have energy recovery, ventilators and heat recovery ventilators, these air exchange units that you can build put into a building.
They’re becoming more calm. And, and they should be, they should be in every building. Because it purges it sends out the stale air and brings in fresh air. And the exchange is through something called heat exchanger exchanges that heat that from the building or the air conditioning energy into the new air so that you’re not just, you know, wasting sending out your, your heated and cooled air. Yeah,
35:19
that’s really cool. That’s actually something we’re looking to get for our basement to do like a air exchange and a heat exchange to Yeah,
Jason Earle 35:26
it’s a very, very, very useful tool, I think every building should have them, especially modern buildings, because we build these buildings out of chemical products, you know, are building material companies or chemical companies make no mistake, just like our food and our pharma companies are. So so so this is this is one of the one of the problems we face now as a society is that we need to be educated about this stuff. And when possible, choose voc free products. And the good news is that the demand has actually led to industry creating them. So ask around for that stuff. If you’re doing a renovation, do not take builder grade materials. Always, always ask the contractor for voc free products go to green guard.org is a great resource for voc unhealthy products.
And then, but then a lot of times we’ve already bought the building, we’re already living in it, you’re not going to you’re not going to remove the paint in your from your walls or the industry or floors. So these energy recovery ventilators allow you to mechanically dilute as those materials off gas over time. Otherwise, what happens is they build up and accumulate indoors, as we sit here and breathe 20,000 times a day.
And then we wonder why we’ve got skyrocketing rates of asthma, allergies, autoimmune disease, not to mention cancer and autism and things like that. And so this, these are things that we didn’t have to worry about when our buildings breathed. You know, so when we had lots of natural ventilation in our buildings, and we built with with with natural, chemically inert materials like plaster, brick, stone, old growth, timber, we’ve gone way off on when it comes to the quality of materials. And then we also tighten up our buildings for energy efficiency all at the same time. And it’s really kind of like the proverbial boiling frog. Yeah, for
37:15
sure. But it’s so helpful for people to know that there are things that they can do, because I think so often when people hear mold, at least I know for me in the past, it was like mold equals, ah, like, I don’t even know what to do. And then for so many people, they’re like, Well, I don’t know what to do. So I’m just going to pretend it’s not there, I’m going to do nothing. I hear that all the time. And so you know, for people who are dealing with Hashimotos, and thyroid issues, but again, it really could be anything. And so often, with Hashimotos, we talk about triggers mold being one of them. But then the other toxins are triggers.
There’s other chemicals, those other viic Vocs that are not microbial are also going to be triggers. So the more that we can support those triggers, the more that actually just takes the pressure off the immune system. And it helps to, as I say, unconfused, the immune system. So Jason, this has been so helpful when people to really understand that it’s not just oh my gosh, you need to like knock your house down, right? Because sometimes people are told that you have mold, literally throw everything out, right? It’s like, let’s not go there. But it’s like, let’s look at the food. Let’s look and see how we can properly remediate and what actually needs to be remediated. And then, like you said, Let’s ventilate and let’s really help that air because there are things that you could do in the meantime to so it’s been so so helpful.
Jason, for people who want to connect with you, how do they contact you? How can they find out more about the test kit, because I think it’s such a wonderful, easy at home, inexpensive option where they could get started and then see, and then I love that you also guide people from that of what to do, and providers that are, you know, are going to be safe that are going to be effective, they’re going to be in the know about this. Yes,
Jason Earle 38:51
thank you for that. And so what we did to make this easy for your listeners, as we created a welcome page, which you can find it got mold.com/mysteries solved, that’s plural mysteries solved, that will post up on that page, you can find a coupon code, which is mysteries 10, which allows any of your listeners to get a 10% discount on any of our test kits. And what you’ll also find there is a link to the ebook that I mentioned earlier. So it’s all in one place.
And then from there, you also have access to our contact form, which is a great way to lob any questions that I ask that you may have. So I don’t I don’t answer all of them. But I do see all of them. The other place for people to contact us and to, to ask questions would be on social specifically on Instagram and on Facebook. So you can go in we actually have a pinned post on Instagram, which is asked asked Jason anything. And so you can go there and ask questions, and I generally get to those pretty quickly.
39:55
Wonderful. Well, Jason, thank you so much for being here and for all of this information. I’m excited for people to explore this a little bit more and for them not to be scared and stressed but actually have things actionable things that they can do so thank you so much and I look forward to connecting with you again soon
Jason Earle 40:12
thanks for having me
