Jan

Carpet Cleaning and Kawasaki Syndrome – No Proven Link

“With all the recent news regarding Kawasaki syndrome, I want to be extra safe with our baby.”

EcoClean always takes every precaution in protecting you, your family, your home environment, and our staff from exposure to any possible health risks.

While I certainly understand your concerns, there is no proven link between Kawasaki Syndrome and carpet cleaning. But it would be best to take safety precautions such as having children or pets stay off the carpet until it is completely dry.

Kawasaki disease (also known as Kawasaki Syndrome) is a rare but serious illness that mainly affects young children.

It is easy to understand that parents are rightly concerned about any threat to their family, especially their children. However, much of the news coverage has been sensationalist. This leads to over-reaction.

On occasion news reports have implied a connection between KS and carpet cleaning. Recent reports, due to the tragic and untimely death of 16 year old Jett Travolta , have suggested that carpet cleaning chemicals might be responsible for Kawasaki Syndrome. No study of KS has ever suggested this connection – either by research study or statistical link.

I sincerely sympathize with any parent whose child contracts this disease.

There have been no studies, scientific, peer reviewed studies linking carpet cleaning, spot removal, or carpet shampooing to Kawasaki Syndrome published since the early 1980′s. If you carefully examine articles on KS that have appeared in peer reviwed medical journals since the 80′s, you will not find any references to carpet cleaning or carpet cleaning chemicals, other than when they are referencing older articles. They all state that the cause of KS is still unknown.

Some facts about Kawasaki Syndrome –

Kawasaki Syndrome first appeared in Japan in the 1960’s after being discovered by Dr. Tomisaku Kawasaki, and has been found to mainly affect infants and young children. (Japan, especially at that time, has very little carpet)

From six to 11 cases per 100,000 children will be diagnosed in the USA each year. It usually strikes children under 5. Most that catch this disease are under 2 years old, although even adult cases have been reported. KS is more common in Japan and other Asian countires. Even in the United States children of Asian heritage are more likely to be diagnosed with KS. It also occurs more often in boys than in girls.

The first association with carpet cleaning was 20 years later when an outbreak occurred in Denver (23 cases) in 1982. 11 of the 23 had been exposed to carpet cleaning within 30 days of the outbreak, 12 of the 23 had no contact with carpet cleaning at all. This is higher percentage than would be expected in a random sample. However, four subsequent investigations as well as laboratory studies have found no correlation between KS and carpet cleaning.

No one brand of shampoo or method of cleaning was associated with Kawasaki syndrome more than any other, although most parents of children with KS applied the shampoo themselves.

Yet the media made the link between the disease and carpet cleaning, creating widespread panic among parents.

Following these findings, the CDC conducted subsequent investigations of Kawasaki Syndrome outbreaks. Four of these investigations and studies conducted by the Maryland State Department of Health and Mental Hygiene and by investigators in eastern Ontario and western Quebec showed no association between Kawasaki Syndrome and carpet cleaning.

The CDC fact sheet, “Kawasaki Syndrome and Rug Cleaning” recommends the following: “… parents should keep in mind that KS is a rare disease. Rug cleaning, in contrast, is very common.

Researchers did find that children who eventually came down with KS were almost always in the room when the shampoo was applied, or came into the room within two hours—significantly earlier than children in the survey who were exposed to shampooed rugs but did not get KS. Thus, it might be prudent, as with any chemical exposure, to keep young children away from newly shampooed rugs for at least several hours.”

Note that the CDC fact sheet prudently recommends that children be kept away from and off of freshly cleaned carpets for eight to twelve hours, preferably longer, at least until they are thoroughly dry. In extreme cases, this might take as long as 48 hours or more.

Cornell University Medical Center concluded that “In the 1960’s when Dr. Kawasaki first described the patients with this syndrome, traditional Japanese houses had tatami mats instead of rugs… It seems unlikely (outbreaks) would be related to rug shampoo.”

The Children’s Hospital, Kempe Research Center also discounted any connection to carpet cleaning many years ago. They state, “We remain frustrated that we still do not know the cause of Kawasaki Syndrome.” (Vol. 1, 1988)

In the conclusion of their report, The Children’s Hospital, Kempe Research Center says “additional studies were also done that examined cleaning methods and p rod uct usage in homes of Kawasaki patients and controls. None of these studies were able to show an association between a single p rod uct or cleaning method and Kawasaki Syndrome.”

Dr. Leung while working for the National Jewish Center for Immunology and Respiratory Medicine in Denver, Colorado agreed that carpet cleaning is not the cause. He says, “The cause of Kawasaki Syndrome is unknown… and is almost certainly not caused by such hazards as recently shampooed carpets.”

Dr. Michael Berry, former deputy director of the (EPA) National Center for Environmental Assessment at Research Triangle Park and current research professor at the University of North Carolina, where he is involved in the Environmental Studies program, and a well-known advocate of indoor air quality, is adamant that carpet cleaning poses no risk at all to human health.

This view is echoed by Werner Braun, president of the Carpet and Rug Institute (CRI), Dalton, GA, who says that he doesn’t know of any scientific studies that relate Kawasaki Syndrome to carpet cleaning and that the theory has not been proven.

Tom Hill, executive director, Institute of Inspection, Cleaning and Restoration Certification (IICRC), Vancouver, WA, also says that the issue is a non-issue, and that it only keeps coming up because of the influence of people such as Travolta and Preston.

“The link basically goes back to an old study that was done by the Harvard School of Medicine in Denver,” says Hill. “However, studies show that the survey they took basically lumped everything from wiping up a spot to renting a machine and calling it carpet cleaning… they didn’t have any incident of the disease connected at all to a professional cleaning.”

Hill believes that Preston is having an emotional reaction to her child being sick, and that the only data that she has been shown that can attempt to find a link to anything is the Denver study from 20 years ago, and she gravitated to that theory.

Hill’s opinion is that the issue is not a carpet cleaning one. It’s certainly sad that children are being afflicted with the disease, he feels, but he believes that carpet cleaning does more to prevent and avoid childhood diseases than cause harm.

Researchers, public health authorities and carpet manufacturers agree that regular professional carpet cleaning has health benefits.

Bill Yeadon, an IICRC-approved instructor with Jon-Don, a carpet cleaning equipment and chemical supply company in Chicago, says that no matter what information you look at, there has been no mention of a link between Kawasaki Syndrome and carpet cleaning except for the infamous Denver study.

“It’s just amazing how we have been pulled into that from one study, and they said it was not conclusive at that point,” Yeadon said.

It’s important to note that none of these studies have been able to determine any relationship between professional carpet cleaning and Kawasaki Syndrome. No specific detergent or cleaning method has been identified as a cause of KS. Many KS patients have not had exposure to carpet cleaning. Exposure to carpet cleaning is not a requirement for contracting KS.

Despite more than 25 years of intensive investigation into the cause and treatment of this disease, epidemiological and laboratory studies have not yet identified an etiologic agent (an agent which causes the disease).

Since no definite cause for KS has been determined, it makes sense that everyone should stay off carpets during the cleaning process. In addition, children should stay off carpets until the carpets are completely dry.