In a recent article in Reuters, it was reported that “Privatizing U.S. military housing was supposed to protect service members’ families. Instead, some of their children are being poisoned by lead. A Reuters investigation unearths dangers in base homes, lapses in military oversight, and a code of silence keeping families at risk. After his son was poisoned, a decorated colonel pushed the Army to ensure other children were not harmed in military housing.”
The article continued to say that after Army Colonel J. Cale Brown’s son was diagnosed with lead poisoning, contractors ordered their home they rented to be tested for lead. The results: “At least 113 spots in the home had lead paint, including several peeling or crumbling patches, requiring $26,150 in lead abatement. Villages of Benning moved the Browns into another old house.”
James M. Barthel, creator of ECOBOND® Lead Defender® commented, “our hearts are burdened when we hear about cases like this. All human life is important, but it feels so much more alarming when children are involved because as a father and grandfather, I can only imagine what these parents are going through.”
“Our Lead Defender formula includes Bitrex®, a bitter-tasting additive to discourage oral contact which creates an added safety barrier to further protect children from lead poisoning by reducing the amount of paint chips or dust a child may ingest.” Barthel continued.
ECOBOND® is the premier provider of environmental products focused on protecting human health from the dangers of lead. The patented Paint-it-on Leave-it-on® formula is different than encapsulants and abatement because it is a lead-based paint treatment providing an easy and affordable solution to this devastating national health crisis. As reported in the Reuters story, abatement can be extremely expensive. According to the EPA, professional lead-based paint removal for the following three options costs about $8 to $15 per square foot or about $9,600 to $30,000 for a 1,200- to 2,000-sq. ft. house.
ECOBOND® Lead Defender® comes in at .25/sq. ft or about $300-$500 for the same 1,200- to 2,000-sq. ft. house.
Barthel continued, “We want our U.S. Military which exists to serve the American people, and to defend the Nation, to enjoy peace of mind from their family being negatively impacted by the dangers of lead paint in their military housing. We are responding to this widespread documented crisis where Reuters reported that private contractors house some 700,000 Americans at more than 100 military installations nationwide, including an estimated 100,000 children ages 0 through 5.
Fort Benning alone is home to some 2,000 small children. Of its 4,001 family homes, 2,274 ‘have lead-based paint present in them,” according to a Villages of Benning memo from November 2017.’”
Barthel announced that, “ECOBOND® Paint, is ready to donate to the U.S. Army a supply of our patented lead paint treatment, ECOBOND® Lead Defender®. We are standing at the ready to come to the rescue of these military families and children negatively impacted by the dangers of lead paint.”