A disturbing video shot by a desperate mother shows a baby struggling to breathe in a home filled with dampness and mould. Gabriel was diagnosed with bronchiolitis after being rushed to the hospital just moments before his mother frantically filmed the heartbreaking video in an attempt to get people to listen.
The family lives in the same block on Rochdale’s Freehold estate as Awaab Ishak, a young boy who died as a result of mould and dampness in the flat where he lived. Award died in December 2020, just days after his second birthday, with a post-mortem indicating environmental lung exposure, according to a Rochdale Coroners Court hearing in July.
An investigation by the Manchester Evening News has since revealed damp and mould issues in other properties on the estate, with young families describing hospital visits due to their children’s inability to breathe.
The investigation prompted the coroner to request additional police action ahead of Awaab’s inquest, and social landlord Rochdale Boroughwide Housing (RBH) stated that it would inspect every home on the estate.
Gabriel’s family, who live in the Ilminster block, say they are constantly fighting mould in the bathroom, living room, bedroom, and kitchen, which was “black” with the infestation at one point. The family has previously tried to leave the estate, and Vilma said: “I went to the council with the video, they said there was nothing they could do.”
The couple moved to Ilminster eight years ago, two months before the birth of their eldest daughter Laura. It gave them the extra space they needed to start a family. But mould problems soon began to mount, they claim.
In an email sent to Homechoice in November 2019, which dealt with social housing bids in Rochdale at the time, Amanyllo described the “great level of the precariousness of danger that this house offers my family”.
He wrote: “After my daughter’s birth, dissatisfaction and torment began to haunt me slowly. It was sad and hard to see my month-old daughter getting sick, and more often my wife and I were visiting [the] GP looking for something to alleviate the problem my daughter innocently carried.
“Now five years old, she still has the same symptoms… confirming the bad conditions and the precarious state of the accommodation. Twelve weeks ago my second child (Gabriel) was born.
“Unfortunately, when my son was 10 weeks old, the same symptoms as his sister were diagnosed, and the GP confirmed that the diseases are caused by the excess humidity and fungus that comes into contact daily inside the house. In this flat, we have drainage of water on the wall of the rooms, accumulation of water on the floor of the rooms, the permanent presence of fungus and humidity in every room of the house.”
Vilma explained that the situation gets worse in the winter, describing ‘water coming in’. “I clean and paint, clean and paint, all the time. When I moved to this house it was very, very bad, I told them,” Vilma said.
“They said there’s nothing we can do. They say ‘keep your windows open. When I got back [from the hospital] I was sleeping in the living room because the bedroom was too bad. “My daughter had the same problem, she was in the hospital taking antibiotics. She was only there for a few hours but my son stayed for seven days.
“I report it so many times. They had some offices here, every day I was there, but they closed it. We call and speak on the telephone. Every time when they come they paint it, but [the mould] is back again.”
The family keeps their windows open and recently spent £50 on a litre of anti-mould paint that was recommended to them. Following the public exposure of the conditions Vilma’s family and others on Freehold were living in last month, RBH says it has begun work at their home and that improvements to prevent mould will be completed in the coming days.