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Healthy Home Report - Lead Based Paint

Home Repairs and Renovations:

What You Should Know About Lead-Based Paint

Any house or apartment built before 1978 may contain lead-based paint. Most homes built before 1960 contain lead-based paint. Lead-based paint produced before 1960 contains higher concentrations of lead than paint manufactured in later years.

Lead-based paint can be on walls, ceilings, woodwork, windows, and sometimes floors. When lead-based paint on these surfaces is broken, sanded, or scraped, it breaks into tiny, sometimes invisible, pieces that you child may swallow or inhale. Even small repair and renovation jobs, including repainting projects, can create enough lead dust and chips to harm you child.

Before You Repair or Renovate

Before you disturb a surface with old paint on it, you should, if possible,

  • Call you local health department and ask if they can test you home for lead-based paint. If the health department cannot test, ask them who can.
  • If lead-based paint if found in your home, have the repair or renovation done by a worker who has been trained to protect you family and home from exposure to lead dust and chips.

    • If You Find or Suspect That Lead-based Paint is Present

    You should avoid the following activities, which can produce paint dust and chips, in areas of your home where you know or suspect there is lead-based paint:

  • scraping, sanding, or using a heat gun on painted surfaces before repainting;
  • making holes in walls to get at pipes or install electrical outlets;
  • tearing out walls;
  • repeatedly bumping furniture or other object into painted walls;
  • unnecessarily opening and closing windows with painted frames and sills.

    • If you must do repairs or renovations yourself in areas where you know or suspect lead-based paint is present, you should

  • Move children and pregnant women to another apartment or house until work is completed and the area is properly cleaned.
  • Cover exposed areas. If the area is small, such as an electrical outlet, keep that area covered until repair and cleanup are competed. If the area being worked on is large, such as a will being torn down, use plastic coverings to seal off entrances and ducts and to protect furniture, carpets, rugs, and floors from paint dust and chips. Dispose of the plastic carefully.
  • To keep dust down, wet painted surfaces before you work on them.
  • Clean up thoroughly.

    • Always clean up dust and chips with wet mops or rags soaked in a solution or trisodium phosphate TSP or phosphate-containing powdered dishwasher detergent and warm water. (Powdered dishwasher detergents are recommended because most have high phosphate contents. Most multipurpose household cleaners are not effective in cleaning up lead dust.) To avoid skin irritation when cleaning up with TSP or high-phosphate dishwasher detergent, wear protective gloves.

    Use tow buckets-one for wash water and one for rinse water. Always wring dirty water into the wash water bucket.

    To prevent re-contamination of cleaned surfaces, wash mops and rags thoroughly after each use. If this is not possible, or if you have already used the mops and rags several times, place them in plastic bags and dispose of them carefully.

  • Avoid sweeping or vacuuming the work area. Sweeping spreads lead dust around. Vacuuming also spreads lead dust around, since tiny lead particles can pass through and out ordinary vacuum cleaners.

    • If Repairs or Renovations Have Already Occured.

    If repairs or renovations of areas you know or suspect contain lead-based paint have already occurred or are occurring in or around you home, you should do the following:

  • Keep children away from paint dust and chips.
  • Clean all dust and chips with wet mops and rags, as described above. Pay special attention to floors and to window sills and window walls (where the bottom of the window sash rests when the window is closed).
  • Close your windows if work is going on outside your home that may be scattering lead dust - for example, a neighbor scraping exterior paint. Washing wet mops and rags, clean up any dust that has gotten into you home.
  • Have you children under six years old teased for lead. To arrange for testing, call you doctor or you local health department.

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