Made In China: American Drywall Disaster

 
Remember the construction boom in 2005-2006?  Remember hurricane Katrina and Ike?

With so many homes being built or rebuilt, there simply wasn't enough sheetrock in the United States to go around.  To make up for the short supply, Chinese companies were contracted to produce drywall.

Apparently that was a HUGE mistake.  The Associated Press reports in Feds: Homes with Chinese Drywall Must Be Gutted:

Thousands of U.S. homes tainted by Chinese drywall should be completely gutted, according to new guidelines released Friday by the Consumer Product Safety Commission. The guidelines say electrical wiring, outlets, circuit breakers, fire alarm systems, carbon monoxide alarms, fire sprinklers, gas pipes and drywall need to be removed.
"We want families to tear it all out and rebuild the interior of their homes, and they need to start this to get their lives started all over again," said Inez Tenenbaum, chairwoman of the commission, the federal agency charged with making sure consumer products are safe.

 The drywall has been linked to corrosion of wiring, air conditioning units, computers, doorknobs and jewelry, along with possible health effects. Tenenbaum said some samples of the Chinese-made product emit 100 times as much hydrogen sulfide as drywall made elsewhere.

The article is very interesting.  The people who are affected by this would have been better off never finishing their homes with these shoddy materials.  It's a shame they were hoodwinked.