Mould in flat caused 2 year old boy's death, coroner rules

[bitchstewie]

Absolutely beyond grim that this passes as acceptable social housing.

Awaab Ishak: Mould in Rochdale flat caused boy's death, coroner rules

[Drclarke]

A very sad case. But why didn’t the family remove the mould themselves or if my son was having continual coughing fits I would anywhere but there.

[Electro1980]

Drclarke said:

A very sad case. But why didn’t the family remove the mould themselves or if my son was having continual coughing fits I would anywhere but there.

You can’t. Unless the route cause is fixed it will grow in places you just can’t reach.

[Dogwatch]

Electro1980 said:

You can’t. Unless the route cause is fixed it will grow in places you just can’t reach.

OK, so what is the route (sic) cause in this case? Looks a reasonably modern block of flats not some leaky Victorian pile.

[bigpriest]

Dogwatch said:

Electro1980 said:

You can’t. Unless the route cause is fixed it will grow in places you just can’t reach.

OK, so what is the route (sic) cause in this case? Looks a reasonably modern block of flats not some leaky Victorian pile.

Inadequate ventilation. Language barriers. Lack of cultural awareness. Midwives not sharing information. A housing provider that thinks saying "we will continue to learn hard lessons" is a valid response.

[maddog993]

bigpriest said:

Dogwatch said:

Electro1980 said:

You can’t. Unless the route cause is fixed it will grow in places you just can’t reach.

OK, so what is the route (sic) cause in this case? Looks a reasonably modern block of flats not some leaky Victorian pile.

Inadequate ventilation. Language barriers. Lack of cultural awareness. Midwives not sharing information. A housing provider that thinks saying "we will continue to learn hard lessons" is a valid response.

Bit disingenuous; Community Midwife had reported it to Children's Services & Health Visitor had also reported it, pleading for family to be moved.

[bigpriest]

maddog993 said:

bigpriest said:

Dogwatch said:

Electro1980 said:

You can’t. Unless the route cause is fixed it will grow in places you just can’t reach.

OK, so what is the route (sic) cause in this case? Looks a reasonably modern block of flats not some leaky Victorian pile.

Inadequate ventilation. Language barriers. Lack of cultural awareness. Midwives not sharing information. A housing provider that thinks saying "we will continue to learn hard lessons" is a valid response.

Bit disingenuous; Community Midwife had reported it to Children's Services & Health Visitor had also reported it, pleading for family to be moved.

Apologies if you know more, I took it from this comment:

In September 2020, a community midwife had completed a special circumstances form to children's services highlighting concerns about the mould and potential impact on his health.

But Ms Kearsley said that document was not shared with the GP or health visitor and there was no evidence to show it was received by children's services or to show that "any action was taken".

[milkround]

I think their is so much more to this story.

To get mould like that they clearly open windows or run heating. That might be due to cold and poverty. But in the uk it’s required.

In that toilet I’m guessing it’s in a bathroom. If you don’t run an extractor fan it’s going to get minging. Which is what’s happened.

The parents are claiming racism. Which I doubt in Rochdale. If the property owner (presumably council) are responsible they should be prosecuted. If the parents caused this they should be exposed and prosecuted as well.

No one should be forced to live like that. But no one should cause a property to get into that state either. There is no way is not be cleaning and bleaching and ventilating if I had to live there.

[Timothy Bucktu]

My daughter was renting a flat for year 2 of Uni with her friend. It was a new'ish place (around 15 years old), but had mould in the floor, behind the bath, under the wallpaper etc. The landlord had tried to hide it, but it quickly came through.
We tried all the magic potions to kill it, but even the Detox mould and mildew spray stuff struggled. I was very much in the 'they must be too lazy to sort it' camp, until experiencing a problem like this.
Despite having windows ajar and running a dehumidifier...it still had mould and made her quite poorly. We could afford to get her out and into a better place...but there are people who can't.
It's a problem only going to get worse with people avoiding turning on the heating.

[Johnnytheboy]

Listening to the radio on the way home, it sounds like it was reported more than once, but the council's system for escalating stuff like this simply didn't work.

Probably doesn't help that a lot of this took place in the middle of lockdown.

[Electro1980]

milkround said:

I think their is so much more to this story.

To get mould like that they clearly open windows or run heating. That might be due to cold and poverty. But in the uk it’s required.

In that toilet I’m guessing it’s in a bathroom. If you don’t run an extractor fan it’s going to get minging. Which is what’s happened.

The parents are claiming racism. Which I doubt in Rochdale. If the property owner (presumably council) are responsible they should be prosecuted. If the parents caused this they should be exposed and prosecuted as well.

No one should be forced to live like that. But no one should cause a property to get into that state either. There is no way is not be cleaning and bleaching and ventilating if I had to live there.

All of the statements say there was inadequate ventilation. It’s all well and good saying “open windows or run the heating”, but what if the extractor fan doesn’t work, the windows don’t open enough or the heating just isn’t good enough?

[maddog993]

bigpriest said:

maddog993 said:

bigpriest said:

Dogwatch said:

Electro1980 said:

You can’t. Unless the route cause is fixed it will grow in places you just can’t reach.

OK, so what is the route (sic) cause in this case? Looks a reasonably modern block of flats not some leaky Victorian pile.

Inadequate ventilation. Language barriers. Lack of cultural awareness. Midwives not sharing information. A housing provider that thinks saying "we will continue to learn hard lessons" is a valid response.

Bit disingenuous; Community Midwife had reported it to Children's Services & Health Visitor had also reported it, pleading for family to be moved.

Apologies if you know more, I took it from this comment:

In September 2020, a community midwife had completed a special circumstances form to children's services highlighting concerns about the mould and potential impact on his health.

But Ms Kearsley said that document was not shared with the GP or health visitor and there was no evidence to show it was received by children's services or to show that "any action was taken".

No apologies necessary & I'm not picking an argument I definitely wouldn't claim to know more, other than perhaps an awareness of procedure normally followed by the Community Health professionals involved. There's obviously been numerous failings leading to Awaab's death, & I agree with almost all of what you said, but just wanted to point out that the Midwife (& HV) had- on the face of the Coroner's enquiry findings- shared information appropriately at the time they saw him (with regards to the Midwife, that would likely only have been post-natally- usually up to around ten days post-birth). Indeed they went beyond what they were required to do, with the Special Circumstances Form to Children's Services by the Midwife & the request from the Health Visitor to Rochdale Borough Housing, explicitly requesting that the family be moved due to the mould.
That Children's Services claimed the SCF was not received is not the same as the Midwife having failed to send it & points more to admin failings at their end. (Both MW & HV would also have documented their actions & findings on the Patient notes on SystmOne, which GP & hospital can access & refer to if deemed necessary).

The GP would not have been contacted routinely unless there was a specific health or development concern at the time of visit found by either MW or HV (while the kiddie was a prem baby, at 31 weeks, the Neonatologist had found no concerns regarding his development) & GP wouldn't have been an appropriate pathway anyway with regard to addressing the specific housing environment concerns.

It's a tragic story, with failings all round, with regard to communication, systems & procedures & Awaab should obviously never have died, but I just feel pointing the finger at Midwife for not sharing information is harsh.

Edited by maddog993 on Tuesday 15th November 21:50

[GranpaB]

Must admit, a bucket of hot water and a strong dilution of bleach would kill that off for a while, so the housing ass could have sent someone in to do that i would have thought.

We did this in a corner of an unused room where mould was starting to show and it never came back, although it certainly wasn't on the scale shown here.

[greygoose]

GranpaB said:

Must admit, a bucket of hot water and a strong dilution of bleach would kill that off for a while, so the housing ass could have sent someone in to do that i would have thought.

We did this in a corner of an unused room where mould was starting to show and it never came back, although it certainly wasn't on the scale shown here.

The parents were advised to paint over it, which obviously failed, but carry on your nonsense.

[Oliver Hardy]

According to the BBC local news the father took legal action and in 2020 the owners offered to carry out work but needed the fathers OK to do so because of the lagal situation but he never did.

[GranpaB]

greygoose said:

GranpaB said:

Must admit, a bucket of hot water and a strong dilution of bleach would kill that off for a while, so the housing ass could have sent someone in to do that i would have thought.

We did this in a corner of an unused room where mould was starting to show and it never came back, although it certainly wasn't on the scale shown here.

The parents were advised to paint over it, which obviously failed, but carry on your nonsense.

Painting over it, is not washing it down with a strong solution of bleach. HTH.

[JagLover]

Many properties can have problems with mould and washing it away is more treating the symptoms.

Many activities of modern life create large amounts of water moisture in the air, some you would expect, such as showers and drying clothes indoors others you may not, for example burning gas will produce moisture.

The main solution is heating and ventilation and that should ideally be permanent ventilation, such as trickle vents, air bricks and automatic extractor fans in showers.

[Caddyshack]

We have a flat let out and one tenant out of 15 yrs worth had a mould problem. The flat was ventilated well. We added more but it just seemed this one tenant would not ever open windows. I think she may have been doing washing and ironing for people so you would hope they would know to open windows and her day job was a cleaner but she would not wipe down the walls. I had to go round and do it. Not had a problem since she left.

It wasn’t on this scale.

I agree that warm water and bleach would have helped.

[ZedLeg]

The certainty with which some are saying that it was at least partially the parents fault is interesting, even though the poor state of social housing has been well publicised.

I guess it’s hard to maintain the illusion that refugees are living large at our expense when you see the conditions they’re living in.

[irc]

On the tv this morning, apparently the bathroom had no windows and the extractor fan didn't work. That is down to the landlord not the tenents.

Poor design relying on an extractor imo. Perhaps acceptable for a 2nd toilet with no shower or bath. Main bathrooms should always have a window.