Healthy: reasons 41 - 46

Real wooden flooring is one of the most anti-allergic floor covering there is. Over the last decades there has been an increase in the numbers of people suffering from allergies, eczema and Asthma.

The Healthy Flooring Network recommends to replace carpets with wooden flooring when you or one of your family members suffers from one or more of the above mentioned ailments/illness

"Wall-to-wall carpet suggests luxury, comfort and warmth, but the appeal diminishes when we look a little closer. Carpets harbour dust, which leads to a build up of dust mites and dust mite allergen – an important trigger for asthma and other allergies. One square meter of carpet can contain up to 100.000 dust mites. Babies and young children exposed to such allergens can become sensitised to them and develop asthma and allergies in later life.

Conventional cleaning, even with the newer types of high-powered vacuum cleaners is not sufficient to remove dust mites and doesn’t have the same impact on asthma symptoms as complete removal of carpet.
However, the cheapest alternative smooth flooring are made of PVC, also known as vinyl, which is a major source of toxic and sometimes persistent substances in the environment. Some research also suggest the softeners in PVC itself may contribute to asthma incidence."

A speck of dust may contain fabric fibers, human skin, bacteria, animal danders, pollen, grains, moulds spores, food particles, mites and mites-droppings. Mites cannot be seen without a microscope. They thrive in warm and humid conditions. Because they feed on skin scales, they love bedding, carpets, upholstered furniture, clothing, closets and car seats. They usually survive ordinary vacuuming because they burrow deep and are equipped with sucking pads on their feet.

Dust cannot hide on wooden flooring, mites can not hold on to wooden flooring, and ordinary vacuum cleaning will remove it all.

"At last my sneezing and itching has stopped. The simple fact of ripping-out our carpets and replacing them with your wooden flooring has had an almost immediate and lasting positive effect on my year long suffering from dust allergy. I only wish I'd done that much earlier."
Mr T. Chappell, Ashford Kent

In 2006 Dispatches on Channel 4 dedicated a two-part program to this increasing problem ("How to beat your kids Asthma") and all specialist consulted strongly advised to rip out carpets and vinyl - a major source of toxic and sometimes persistent substances in the environment, known to trigger attacks - and to replace it with wooden floors immediately. Like ceramic tiles wooden flooring is a hard floor covering, any dust or dirt will stay on top of the flooring and will not penetrated in the layers beneath.

Property managers: the very same applies to you - how many potential tenants might suffer from allergies, eczema or Asthma? By offering them your property with the most anti-allergic floor covering around you improve the chance of renting it tenfold.

In rooms/areas we "entertain" most, we - as normal human beings - want to show how well off we are. The highest quality in wooden flooring are selected more often for these "reception" areas than lower quality floors. These areas also get the highest amount of traffic and the wooden floor has to be more sturdy and durable.

In bedrooms however it is more down to what is most practical, both budget wise and health wise, to install. Many manufacturers have 'low' budget ranges - still good quality! - for these areas. A simple 3-strip Oak Rustic comes to mind.
On average we spend 7 - 9 hours a day sleeping in our beds, a rather large uninterrupted part of the day to be in one single room. In this respect, installing wooden flooring in bedroom is a wise and healthy decision.