[Structural and environmental hygiene of buildings for pre-school and mandatory education, in Italy]

[Autom. eng. transl.] Exposure to potential sources of risk for multifactorial pathologies, including respiratory and allergic diseases, whose evolution is generally chronic-degenerative, is all the more serious the greater the susceptibility and "immaturity" of defense systems active and passive of exposed organisms. From this point of view, the exposure in the compulsory schooling of children in childhood and / or adolescence to chemical, physical and biological pollutants appears to be one of the main culprits of the chronic-degenerative pathologies that can potentially develop along the life of the individual, even in old age. Since most school activities take place in closed environments for around 92.5% of the daily time, great importance is represented by the "indoor" air quality, influenced by different factors and, in fact, multiple: the quality of outdoor air , the structural configuration of the building, the presence of internal pollution sources, the activities that take place in different environments (for example laboratory or artistic activities, etc.), specific emission sources (for example glues used for furniture or paints, or emissions from printers, photocopiers, etc ...). Nobody, even today, knows exactly the extent of the problem, globally estimating that 10-30% of new school buildings in the western and industrialized world suffer from some problem (WHO, 2010), for example: the rate of ventilation and spare parts for air is low (about 0.5 air changes / hour on national averages); indoor air temperature has generally increased by about 1.3 ° C in the last ten years (consider the consequences on the Greenhouse Effect); an average 22.6% increase in allergies related to indoor allergens was found; population samples, in different studies and countries, indicate an average level of about 28-36% of students / teachers who define the school environment as uncomfortable. To begin to better understand the hygienic-sanitary implications that construction and the environment can have in the school environment, it should be considered that in the past the materials used for civil construction, like the school one, were few and of them we had a long experience, so that although they were not technologically advanced, so much so that the problems were linked to the maintenance of the environmental temperature and the degree of optimal relative humidity, but also to the supply of water and to the resulting wastes, the aforementioned materials had as such a low impact on people from a chemical and physical point of view. In the present, also, the new materials, precisely because technologically advanced, while responding to the needs that the old materials could not support as to the habitability of the buildings, are often synthetic and insufficiently tested from the point of view of impact on the person and the environment , highlighting, together with the design and construction choices, problems in buildings related to multiple substances, not known and / or tested, used / or incorrect use of them. In the western world, and especially in Italy, moreover, since the 1950s or, even better, 1960s, phenomena of demographic growth and industrial and urban development have begun to be observed rapidly, depending on the subsequent economic recovery. at the war events of World War II. The building impulse was so rapid and "chaotic" that the old technologies and building structures were no longer sufficient to meet the needs of the population in education so that the educational heritage suddenly became obsolete and old, and in need of urgent implementations. This also due to the new energy needs that will develop in the 1970s (energy crisis, ne