Asthma and vinyl tile

My son works in the construction department for a chain-type hospital. 

They just let out a contract to replace all the vinyl tile flooring in all the waiting rooms and certain other rooms of all their hospitals, with carpet.  However, they had a hard time finding carpet without vinyl in the backing.  They are doing it because they found the vinyl flooring was "out gassing" and making asthma patients worse. 

I tried to think of a way homeowners and renters could accomplish that without tearing up their house.  The best I came up with was putting something over the vinyl to block the outgassing and then something like sisal over that.  

I have no idea if this is new or old info, but I thought I'd write about it in case it was new.

bev

 

I have no idea what people do or may have tried, nor do I know if what I dreamed up would work. I just know I couldn't afford to tear up a floor, so I tried to think of alternatives.

I was curious and looked up "vinyl outgassing" on Google after I posted. It outgasses formaldehyde. Yuck!

It said some only lasts a few days, some lasts a few months, and some goes on for years and years. They said never clean vinyl with a petroleum based product; that makes it worse. They recommended opening new houses for several days before moving in. I still do the old school thing of opening windows without regard for the temperature fairly regularly.

One place talked about the particle board cupboards outgassing--today they use a slightly different material and clad them, inside and out, with materials to prevent the out gassing. So sealing might work.

I don't know the answer, but after reading the websites, it's definitely something to consider and to watch for as a cause of differing behavior in different places.

bev