Old carpet - safety concern about the new born..

[Yarra]

Hi All,

I am expecting my baby in April. The rented unit I am living has got very old carpet, probably 20 - 30 years old. Even though we steam cleaned I know the deep layers of the carpet is not touched and I am worried about it old dust trapped inside, bringing up old fungi, dust mites and stuff.

The landlord is not keen on to change the carpet, so all I can do is staem clean, but still there's awful lot of dust couple of days after steam cleaning, which I assume must be coming from underneath.. Please share your advise and experience guys, I am so concerned about baby catching on allergies, asthma etc,.

Have you ever kept a new born in such an old carpet and did it cause any issues?

Thanks heaps.......

[the_queen]

My first thought was that you could get a room-sized rug for the lounge room, if bubby will be on the floor in there.

My second thought is that you could move to a place with hard floors - but probably not a realistic option.


I guess if you just do every.single.other.thing to lower the risk of asthma (ie breastfeed, no solids until 6 months or more, no smoking whatsoever, reduce use of chemicals in the home, etc etc etc) then you've done all you can do.


Have you got a family history of asthma? Asthma is fairly environmental but in large part it's also genetic (someone correct me if I'm wrong)

Congrats on the bub! To be honest, if it was me, if it was bad enough to worry me now, I'd probably move house.

[julietv8]

Do you have a good vacuum? Mine has a power head and it seems to rip the dust out of our old carpet. Thankfully our landlords allowed us to pull the carpet up out of the baby's room and put down some hard flooring. The only thing i can think of is to maybe get a rug big enough to cover the room and lay a plastic drop sheet between it and the old carpet?

If not, you can mix 100ml of methylated spirits with 25ml of eucalyptus oil in a spray bottle and lightly spray it over your carpet, leave it for an hour or so to kill dust mites then just just vacuum and steam clean normally.

[Ky]

If you are notcing old stains reappearing not long after having your carpet cleaned, then the company you are using are not doing their job well.

If the right heat, pressure and chemical is being used, the carpet will be cleaned down to the deep layers and should be fine for bubs. If you are concerned, see if the company offers an anti-microbial/anti allergen treatment - it has been proven to lower the incidence of asthma and excema in families that are prone to them.

If old stains are reappearing, this is called "wicking through". It shows that just the top layers have been cleaned and the original cause of the stain is still near the carpet backing fabric. The carpet will be clean enough, but it is a good reason to get the company to come back and complete the job properly for you - it should be done free of charge (unless you have signed a waiver).

Don't worry too much about the fact that the carpet is old - keep it well vacuumed, get it cleaned regularly (every 6 months is recommended) and be glad that bub is gently getting a strengthened immune system. Some of the older carpets are of a much higher quality than recent ones and they are more likely to be made of natural fibres.

Can you tell that I have been in the industry for years??? Glad to be out of it now