Mold has chased the Ewings from their Loris home. Everything inside is essentially ruined, covered with toxic mold spores distributed through the air conditioning system.

Caroline Ewing cried for months. "You feel like you've lost your home and your history - we have lost our history," she said. South Carolina's humidity creates mold-related problems for homeowners - problems that can't be measured by existing governmental health guidelines and generally aren't covered by insurance. Mold even forced Gov. Mark Sanford and his family to bail out of the Governor's Mansion while crews undertake a remediation project that could exceed $1 million.

Four days ago, mattress maker Select Comfort (Nasdaq: SCSS) lost 22% of its value in a single afternoon of furious selling. But the Hidden Gems selection had not turned in a poor earnings report or warned of flagging sales. Instead, a local St. Paul, Minn. television station had aired a story about some mold found inside a mattress.

In one of my pre-Motley Fool careers, I was a news assignment editor for a local TV station (that was right after I'd been the sports director/weekday anchor, and right before I ran a print shop at a horse racing track). So I know a little bit about what makes for a newsworthy story.

The sleepless nights continue at bedmaker Select Comfort Corp., where shares dropped 22 percent Monday after a news report on KSTP-TV, Channel 5, featured several unhappy customers with moldy mattresses.

It was the second steep stock decline in three weeks for the maker of the Sleep Number adjustable bed. On July 12, the company's stock fell 26 percent after it cited worries about softening second-quarter sales and revised its 2004 earnings guidance downward.

COLUMBIA, S.C. - Think you have a mold problem in your home? If you can see it or smell it, chances are you do. And if you have a mold problem, chances are you have water where it's not supposed to be.

"Mold requires water or moisture. Unless you have that ingredient, you won't have a mold issue," said Dianne Minasiam, program coordinator in the South Carolina health department's Bureau of Air Quality. "The right temperature and humidity helps it. But water's the first thing."

Author's Comment: I've never seen this in action, but it sounds intriguing . . . if anyone tries this out, let me know how it works -- Cyn. Largo, FL (PRWEB) August 2, 2004 -- The Mold Minder magnet concept was a serendipitous accident for businessman Bob Trope. This patent pending new product will help warn consumers of moisture problems in their homes or businesses before they develop mold problems.

As it is with many innovative new ideas, the Mold Minder magnet proved to be a fortunate accident for Bob Trope, owner of Process Automation Corporation (known as Magnets by PAC). While reviewing a new foil paper sample for his magnet products, Trope noticed that the paper consistently curled in the moist environment of his Gulf Coast home, making it unsuitable for use in his business. Shortly thereafter he discovered that the excess moisture had caused mold to grow in his walls. Trope combined his paper and moisture problems with a mechanical engineering background and the Mold Minder magnet was conceived.

DURHAM -- The state Attorney General's Office has sued four of the five contractors it blames for faulty construction and the toxic mold that shuttered two N.C. Central University dormitories in 2003.

At stake in the two suits filed Monday is roughly $7 million that the state spent to renovate the New Residence Halls I and II, which will reopen for NCCU students later this month.

This is a website dedicated to Aspergillus, sponsored by major drug manufacturers, such as Merck and Pfizer. Drug manufacturers care about Aspergillus because certain species of Aspergillus produce mycotoxins. For example, Aspergillus fumigatus creates a dizzying array of mycotoxins -- Fumitremorgin A, Verruculogen, Gliotoxin, Fumagillin, Fumigaclavine, Helvolic acid, Sphingofungins, Brevianamide A, Phthioic acid. Even the relatively benign seeming Aspergillus niger (used commercially to produce citric acid) produces malformin.

Here's a bit of an Introduction to Aspergillus from the website: Aspergillus is a group of moulds, which is found everywhere world-wide, especially in the autumn and winter in the Northern hemisphere. Moulds are also called filamentous fungi. Only a few of these moulds can cause illness in humans and animals. Most people are naturally immune and do not develop disease caused by Aspergillus. However, when disease does occur, it takes several forms.

Martinsville -- State officials have determined that mold did not cause Morgan County Courthouse employees to get sick. Donna Chastain, environmental health specialist for the Morgan County Health Department, said she expects results Monday from chemical tests conducted by the state this week.

"I don't know where we go from here," she said. The County Commissioners ordered the courthouse closed Monday and Tuesday after up to five employees complaining of sore throats visited their doctors. The problems began July 28 when employees noticed a foul smell in the circuit court room.

Schools are dangerous places for the nearly 5 million children who have asthma, the nonprofit group Allergy & Asthma Network Mothers of Asthmatics (AANMA) warns as kids head back to school. Too many of the nation's schools deny students access to lifesaving asthma medication, lack a full-time nurse, and contain symptom-causing allergens and irritants.

"We send our kids off to school trusting that they'll be safe," says AANMA President Nancy Sander. "Instead, children with asthma are dying at school because they didn't have immediate access to their inhalers, or because the one trained nurse happened to be at another school that day." Asthma kills 15 people every day and is the leading cause of missed school days. A deadly asthma attack can strike anytime, anywhere -- playgrounds, lunchrooms, school buses, or classrooms. Yet only 18 states have passed legislation giving students the right to carry and self-administer their inhalers at school.

MISSION - A Mission school board member and real estate agent, along with two other Mission residents, was arrested Thursday on charges of insurance fraud. Noralinda "Norie" Gonzalez-Garza, a current board trustee and former president of the Mission school board, is a subject of a complaint filed by Officer Victor C. Rojo Jr. of the Texas Department of Insurance.

In his July 1 complaint, Rojo alleged that Garza, along with Miguel and Miriam De Anda of Mission, worked together to defraud State Farm Insurance Companies of $31,000.

www.schoolmoldhelp.org is exactly what it sounds like -- a website dedicated to helping folks dealing with mold problems in schools. This site is just over four months old.

These are the Guiding Principles and Reasons for Action

1. Our nation depends upon healthy, safe schools!
2. School Mold Help encourages you to become part of the solution!
3. We provide the best combined resources and information available.
4. Remember that students, workers and parents are in the school environment.
5. We encourage that you form a group to work on this problem!
6. Work toward a solution that protects the health of everyone in the school!

This is an old fave of mine, for the truly germ-phobic.

Winter Shower-Stall Mold Expedition Wrap-Up April 2003 - "It was quite an adventure, but with a great finale," said househusband, Bob Gloret, whom TMH found last month on his hands and knees administering his usual before-bedtime scrub-down to his Ghana, Ohio, bathroom. Gloret had just spent an exhilarating weekend venturing into the darkest corners of his shower stall on a preemptive search- and-disinfect mission against a potential early spring outbreak of dreaded black mold.