This is what I am doing to protect myself against airborne viruses. Nothing is fool-proof especially when you already have a compromised immune system, and when the government offers me a flu preventive shot, I will take it as I always do, but this time I will make it a priority.

Lotus Water Sanitizing system

1. Make sure that you and others cough into your arm instead of into the air; this is a practice which everyone in our office and my home follows.

  2. Wash your hands frequently and thoroughly with soap, and carry a bottle of hand sanitizer with you to public places.

  3. If I was traveling by airplane I would wear a mask, since I always without fail get sick from airplane travel.

  4. I would take extra care to wash/sanitize fruits and veggies - who knows who has coughed on them in the supermarket. We have a Lotus Water Sanitizing system ($154.95) which will both sanitize your fruits and veggies and turn ordinary water into a disinfectant- albeit for about 15 minutes, but enough to wipe down a whole lot of counter tops.

  http://www.allergybuyersclubshopping.com/lotus-sanitizing-water-systems.html

5. If the spread of flu gets any worse, I will put an Airfree Onyx Sterilizer ($269) on my desk or a Germ Guardian Sanitizer ($129) which have proven virus killing technologies. You can also take a look at some of our other sanitization products.

  http://www.allergybuyersclubshopping.com/uv-sanitization-products.html

6. I have been meaning to install an IQAir Perfect 16 whole house air purifier (starting at $2695), but now since you cannot figure out ahead of time which room a virus can hit, a whole house solution seems eminently sensible, and I have more to justify the cost than my seasonal allergies which are causing me to have endless sneezing fits.

  The IQAir Perfect 16 includes professional installation and delivers 6 air changes per hour throughout your home. It does not get better than that. Failing that I would recommend an IQAir Cleanroom ($1599) or an IQAir HealthPro Plus ($799) room air purification models. I do have to add a caveat as to the efficacy of air purifiers - if the virus reaches you before it reaches the air purifier then you have no protection. You are more likely to have contact with the virus through a child bringing it home from school or if you have a job coming into contact with the general public.

  7. For simply brilliant sanitization of your home using steam cleaning there is nothing that comes close to a Ladybug Steam cleaner with TANCS (starting at $1499) that uses nanotechnology to turn everyday water into an EPA registered disinfectant. I have one and love it for a myriad of reasons.

There is nothing out there that will give you 100% virus protection, without holing yourself up in clean room isolation, but a few simple precautions seem like a sensible thing to do.

Periodically my cleaning lady cannot resist buying a bottle of Windex, and I have a nutty because I have mild MCS (multiple chemical sensitivity) and also hate the odor of chemicals. So I have stocked up on our new EcoDiscoveries line of eco-friendly, non-toxic cleaning products, and for now my cleaning lady and I seem to have made peace. I would advise getting their introductory whole house kit and trying all the products in their line up and save on shipping. One of the brilliant things that they have done is ship the bottle empty and give you a little bottle of concentrate which actually makes two whole bottles - you just fill up with water. So you actually get two bottles for the price of one. You can get the refills at anytime and be good to the environment. And all their products work just as well as the supermarket chemical ones- but without the health hazards. I give this brand two thumbs up.

Available as a complete cleaning kit (now on sale for $52.95, or sold individually starting at $9.95 for a bottle).

http://www.allergybuyersclubshopping.com/ecodiscoveries-natural-cleaning-products.html

Fragrance Free Textile Candles Starting at $18.89

We managed to launch our new line of allergy friendly Imagination candles the week after Christmas. Not the best of timing, but we wanted to make sure that this line of simply beautiful candles did not add any pollution to the room - and our testing team was backed up with new product testing.

I have been depriving myself of candles for years because I did not want to add particulates to any room of my home. When I saw these fragrance free candles and was stunned at their exquisite patterns, achieved by a patented process, I begged our testing team to add them to their schedule. I am pleased to say that they came out with flying colors, and no increase in particulates was detected after several hours of candle burning in a tiny room.

I am especially enchanted at their textile design which has a candle at the bottom of a wax wall, so the light can shine through the pattern. The effect is stunning. My only grumble is that you definitely need a long taper to light the candle. Lighting the candle with a twisted up piece of long paper is NOT the way to go and left a black sooty mark on the candle wall. So now I am informed. But I am also in love. If you like candles or have a loved one who likes candles, these ones are fragrance free and have dozens of patterns to choose from. They would make a great gift to cure someone of the winter blues or for upcoming Mother’s Day. Starting at $18.99.

http://www.allergybuyersclubshopping.com/candles.html

We have just launched a line of eco friendly household cleaners from Eco Discoveries and the initial feedback we are getting from testers is very positive. This line of household cleaners is both non-toxic and fragrance free, as well as being not too expensive. We will let you know more as our testers give us more specific evaluations.

Starting at $6.49.

http://www.greenandmore.com/non-toxic-natural-household-cleaners.html

Hypodown pillows are for all those who cannot abandon their down pillows even though they have allergies. The favorite among our staff is the Hypodown 800 fill Soft pillow. It is also my husband’s favorite pillow as he is a real traditionalist. These beautiful down pillows have very high quality and ultra clean down mixed in with a tiny bit of natural Syriaca which enhances its hypoallergenic properties. When the term hypoallergenic is applied to pillow, it means that you are very unlikely to react to the pillow if you have feather allergies. It does not mean that dust mites cannot accumulate in them, or if exposed to dampness, that the pillow would not become moldy. But if you want a top notch down pillow that does not have you sneezing because of feather allergies, then Hypodown pillows can cradle your head at night with blissfully soft down. Definitely recommended.

The Hypodown 600 Fill Quality Down Pillows start at $104.95.

  http://www.allergybuyersclubshopping.com/pillows.html

By Mercia Tapping, President, AllergyBuyersClub.com

This ultrasonic warm and cool mist model of the Air-O-Swiss humidifier line up is very likely to become my new favorite humidifier this winter season. I tried it out when I had a hacking cough and kept waking in the night, and it definitely helped my breathing and reduced the amount of time I coughed in the night. Specifically, this is what I found.

PLUSES

1.   After cursing my office for not sending me home with a manual, I found that Air-O-Swiss had thoughtfully put operating instructions inside the humidifier in an easy to view spot. Great for those who lose the paper manual anyway. I did figure out most of it, and got it operational without the manual, and I am not very handy, but the actual instructions were a nice bonus!

2. I found the size and the shape of the humidifier made it the easiest of machines that I have ever tested. It still fills up from the bottom, but even when it was full, it was a cinch to carry it and did not need assistance from my spouse. Actually, I did ask for assistance once, but that was more from being annoyed at the hours of his couch potato behavior when I was doing all the housework!

3. This humidifier is almost completely silent, most people will think it is totally silent, but I hesitate to say that for 100% of the population, since there is always someone outside the norm. However, I defy you to hear it the other side of your bedroom from your bed.

4. The humidifier dispersed out a satisfying amount of mist, and the humidity in my room increased quite quickly .It was not a fair test however, since my Siamese cats kept walking in an out of the bedroom.

5. I confess to really liking the styling, and the silver/black color fitted nicely and unobtrusively with the bedroom décor.

MINUSES

1. If there was one thing to pick on it was how the digital read out of humidity levels worked. I checked the humidity readings on this machine against a separate hygrometer on several occasions in a medium size bedroom, and turned the machine on and off. I found that the humidifier tends to read high, but usually settled down within 2 minutes to a level that was zero to 2 degrees different than my hygrometer. On one occasion it took more like 5 minutes, and on the other I fell asleep, but when I woke up it was in sync with the hygrometer. Naturally, it varied a bit according to where the hygrometer was placed in the room. This is a very minor gripe but enough to knock off half a star from from what would otherwise have been a five star rating. I am going to continue to test it over time and suspect its rating will eventually go up.

2. You do have to figure out the controls when you have them up close and personal on a counter top, and then memorize them, because once you put this humidifier onto the floor, unless you have eagle, youthful eyes you will not be able to differentiate the controls from far away.

Starting at $199.95 the Air-O-Swiss 7144 Humidifier covers up to 650 sq. ft.

Being a cat fan when I saw this little wind up rechargeable LED flash light, it was on my “must buy” gift list for every friend I have who is also a cat lover like me. It is absolutely adorable and actually gives off a decent amount of light. When the lights went out in our offices recently it was this little cat LED flash light that saved the day when I wanted to visit the Ladies Room! It is small enough to fit in a purse and can save you fumbling on a dark night when you are trying to fit your front door key in lock. Starting at $14.99

http://www.greenandmore.com/greenandmore-blackcat-rechargeable-LED-flashlight.html

Before you rush ahead and install a tankless water heater (starting at $177 for a Mini Tank Heater) in your home you need to do some investigation to decide whether indeed it is the right option for you and your family. Let’s be clear, I am a great fan of tankless water heaters and grew up with them 40 years ago in England and they are the wave of the future, but like every appliance they have their pluses and minuses.

On the Plus Side:

 

• You never need to worry about a water heater failure and flood while you are out for the day - let alone away on vacation. That peace of mind is worth quite a bit in my book.

 

• A tankless water heater can easily last 20 years and we have heard of some lasting over 50 years, so over the long haul they can yield enormous replacement water heater cost savings.

 

• Hot water in a family accounts for about 10-13% of their total energy bill. Using tankless water heaters, an average family can save about $250 a year in energy costs.

 

• Both federal and state governments are promoting the use of tankless water heaters so you might get as much as $100 credit for purchasing one. We predict that in the future all new homes will have tankless systems in them.

 

• Hot water on demand is literally endless, so if the unit is properly sized, there is never a possibility of running out of hot water even if everyone in the family is using hot water for showers, dishwashers and laundry at the same time.

 

On the Minus Side:

 

• While the cost of the tankless water heater is about the same as a conventional water heater, the installation is often much more expensive with the break even point at five years of more out. So if you are not planning on staying in your house very long this might not be a good choice for you. The plumbing part of installation is quite simple but most home owners will have to spend quite a bit of money on electrical upgrades to their breaker box to bring in several dedicated 220 volt lines. Herein lies the installation cost which can run as much as $500-$1500.

 

• While tankless water heaters last so much longer than their conventional counterparts, they are not without some maintenance costs every 5 to 7 years. There are electric heating coils inside the water heater and this is its point of failure especially if air gets into the water pipes. This may happen more often than you think because the mains water can get shut off outside when road repairs are taking place and you may or may not get notified that this is taking place. Also if you shut off your water when you are going on vacation then you will have noticed that it “spits and sputters” on your return and you need to let the COLD water run for 5 to 10 minutes before turning on the hot water. The good news is that the element only costs $35 and can be easily replaced by the home owner. This is a spare part that we recommend having put aside somewhere so you never have to be without hot water.

 

• You need to decide what is the perfect water temperature for your house, which can be a bit difficult if you have bathrooms on 3 different levels. The bathroom on the highest level will always have water which is slightly cooler than downstairs. We all typically run the water hot then mix it with cold to get the perfect temperature. Stands to reason that you do not want to spend money heating up water only to then cool it down afterwards. Relearning that behavior will take some getting used to.

 

• If you have the kind of furnace which is designed to “free heat” your water heater, then you are only heating up your hot water in the summer months, which would make your payback period much longer and may give you pause to consider whether it is a viable project for you.

 

This being said I gamely volunteered to be the corporate guinea pig to install a tankless water heater in my house. My conventional water heater was 11 years and due to burst any day, so I was taking a chance in keeping it going. I chose a top of the line Eemax system and opted for external digital controls to regulate my water temperature. I have an oil based system and it was 10 years old and is an accident waiting to happen. My house is 25 years old so I do have a modern circuit breaker panel system but it was too small to accommodate any more breakers.

My Results:

 

• In all I spent $200 on a circuit breaker upgrade parts and $300 for the labor. Probably not too different than regular water heater installation costs. There were no problems in the installation- it worked perfectly from the get go.

 

• The wonderful thing that I found about the tankless system, is that whether it is for a long hot soak in the bath or prolonged shower, which I do twice a day to loosen up my back. Guess what? The hot water never runs out!

 

• I found that the hot water takes about 10-12 seconds more to run hot than my conventional hot water heater, but not enough to be annoying. And then the water can really be as hot as I want.

 

• We have had some very frigid weather in the Northeast this winter and it was so nice not to worry about frozen or burst pipes when we were away on vacation.

 

• In winter, my oil heating system partially heats my hot water, but nevertheless my electricity bill was $15 less in the first full month of use. In the summer months, the savings will be much larger as I will not be using my oil furnace at all. I reckon I will save $15 each month for 9 months and then a minimum of $100 in oil over the summer for a total annual savings of $235 in energy savings in the first year. Given that a tankless hot water heater can last 20 years ,it will not be long before I am ahead of the game.

 

Starting at $177.99

http://www.greenandmore.com/tankless-hot-water-heaters.html

We have a bunch of these hygrometers scattered throughout our house as I like to make sure that the humidity level is being kept under control, preferably no more than 50% humidity. Above this humidity level is when both mold spores and dust mites can start to breed. By using these hygrometers I have peace of mind and so can you. Priced at $39.95 and it also features a thermometer and clock.  

http://www.allergybuyersclubshopping.com/thermometer-hygrometer.html

Here is the Five minute ABC video that was shot at my home. It provides some quick tips on what you can do to reduce allergens in your home. Sorry about the ads.