I'm no expert, so take this with a grain of salt/check with your doctor to
be sure. PCV is Polyvinylchloride, a synthetic plastic-like material. You
often see it in plumbing fixtures, but it can be used in all sorts of ways.
It could easily be made into a mask. The only problem I would see is that
you cannot guarantee that there is no natural rubber--the mask could have
different types of compounds in its construction. Some may be labelled as
containing no natural rubber latex. Those are probably okay. But, if in
doubt you should always check with the manufacturer. You can ask for
assistance at the store or see if you can get the contact info from the
packaging itself. You should also be careful of makeup kits (especially
some of the putties, etc.), candy bowls with grabbing hands, and anything
that has a soft rubber consistency--but again, they may be perfectly okay.
Rather than take chances, see if you can check them out, but don't just give
up on Halloween altogether. :)

One thing you may want to be careful of is going near any heavy
concentration of masks/Halloween sections. I went to a local Halloween
store and itched from head to toe and had some problems with my asthma. All
things considered, it was probably stupid of me to set foot in the place,
but I decided to take the chance, although I kept the exposure to as much of
a minimum as possible, steering clear of the mask section changing/clothes,
washing up once I got home. But if you can send someone else :) it would be
better. If you do purchase an item that is does not contain NRL itself, but
may have been exposed by hanging around in the store next to the rest of it
or in the plant when it was made, you may want to wash it before trying it
on, or have someone else do so for you, just to take what precautions you
can to keep exposure down.

-----Original Message-----
From: janet6352@... [mailto:janet6352@...]
Sent: Wednesday, September 26, 2001 5:27 PM
To: LANTERN@yahoogroups.com
Subject: [LANTERN] guess what


I was so happy to see something today(it is bad that this makes me
happy but it is needed), I was shopping & I noticed that Halloween
masks was marked if it was latex. What is PVC? Why would it be in a
mask? Is it safe for someone who is allergic to latex? I hope to get
some answers please





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