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Warning: Vacate room when CFL bulb breaks
Energy-saving devices called so dangerous everyone must leave for at least 15 minutes
Posted: January 6, 2008
1:00 a.m. Eastern
© 2008 WND (IMG:http://www.worldnetdaily.com/images2/edison-in-lab.jpg)
Thomas Edison, inventor of mercury-free light bulb
Thomas Edison must be rolling over in his grave.Less than a month after the U.S. Congress passed an energy bill banning the incandescent light bulb by 2014, the UK Environment Agency issued guidelines calling for evacuation of any room where an energy-saving compact fluorescent light bulb is broken, releasing toxic mercury.The warning comes a month before the British government begins its phase-out of tungsten bulbs, scheduled to be completed in 2011. The switchover to CFL bulbs will save at least five million tons of carbon dioxide emissions every year, the government said.Health experts warned this week that people with certain skin ailments will suffer from the new eco-friendly bulbs which cause conditions such as eczema to flare up. Additionally, the bulbs have been linked to migraine headaches in some people.