Dear Friend,

       5000 Women who worked for sweatshops in Texas have sued jean maker Levi Strauss Inc. and others for failure to provide safety equipment to protect them from injuries from exposure to textile dust containing formaldehyde, a known carcinogen.

       Levi's has been sued before. In the other suits other companies sued together with Levi's admitted their failures and compensated the victims, unlike Levi's who stonewalled the case, until it got dismissed.

       The women say they were injured by their daily exposure to fifty five gallons of textile dust generated by every ten sewing machines every four days the plant was operating. One of the facilities had over nine hundred sewing machines.

       The women say that when they complained that the textile dust would irritate their eyes, noses, sinus and throats, the company would tell them, it's not the dust, it's your allergies caused by the pollen from the plants and trees around your home, trusting Levi's they believed the lie.

       The women would still believe Levi's, but for Drs. Carrillo, Jones and Padron, who have done bronchial endoscopies, x-rays, ct scans, pulmonary function tests as well as EKG's on them, putting together the most comprehensive data base of what happens to workers when their bosses' are willing to risk the health of their employees for profit.

       In the case here, Levi's hasn't changed, it has hired political power brokers to get to the state agencies, stonewalling, denying wrong doing, rejecting medical reports of the injuries sustained, saying that the women only have allergies from the pollen off plants around their homes. Tactics more often used by drug dealers rather then responsible corporations.

       A DEA agent told the women that Levi's position was similar to the grower of the crops from which heroin is derived. That to succeed you went after the pushers.

       Levi's biggest pusher is JC Penny. The Levi's victims are asking all persons, who been victimized, by Levi's or others, and all persons of goodwill to boycott JC Penny until they stop pushing Levi's products.

       Thank you for you time. Your support and feedback is greatly appreciated.

The presence of genotoxic and bioactive components in indigo dyed fabrics--a possible health risk?
Rannug U,
Bramstedt H,
Nilsson U.
Department of Genetics, University of Stockholm, Sweden

EXTRACTS OF PURE cotton and jeans fabrics were tested for mutagenicity in Salmonella-typhimurium strains TA98 and TA100. The vat dye indigo, technical grade as well as 98% and greater than 99.5% pure, was also tested for mutagenicity. Synthetic indigo, indirubin and isatin were tested for TCDD receptor affinity in competition experiments in vitro. The mutagenicity of the extracts was associated with the cotton denim and nondyed cotton gave only marginal effects. The mutagenicity of the indigo dyed fabrics was dependent on type and treatment of the fabrics. Extracts of both bleached and nonbleached jeans gave mutagenic effects on TA98 +/- S9 and TA100 +/- S9. The greatest effects were seen in the presence of S9. Bleaching gave an additional increase in the mutagenicity in the absence of S9. Normal washing of the fabrics after bleaching reduced the mutagenicity. Synthetic indigo of technical grade or 98% pure showed mutagenic effects, especially on TA98 + S9. Further purification to 99.5% reduced the mutagenicity to 24 revertants/mg (6.2 rev/mu mole). Considering the amount of indigo in the extracts and its low mutagenicity, the genotoxicity of jeans extracts must be caused by other unknown components. However, indigo showed a high (Kd = 1.9 nM) affinity for the Ah or TCDD receptor. Indigo can therefore still be a potential health risk either by eliciting toxic effects of other compounds or by being a nongenotoxic carcinogen. The worldwide use of jeans with a possible exposure of a large population to genotoxic and biologically active components emphasizes the need for a more thorough characterization of these effects.

PMID: 1378557 [PubMed - indexed for MEDLINE]

Mr. Robert Hood
JC Penny Legal Department
Plano, Texas
E-Mail: Rhood@JCPenny.com

Dear Sir,

       Attached is a letter that I am sending to all victims as well as to all persons of goodwill. Also attached is a copy of an extract of a medical article that I obtain from PubMed. Both the letter and the article are self explanatory.

       I am writing you this letter asking you to inform your employer JC Penny to stop from pushing Levi products. And for you to request from Levi's any and all information they have of the probable heath affects that the dyes they use in their jeans can have, has had and will have on the people that have purchased jeans from one of the JC Penny stores.

       Furthermore, we are requesting that you fully disclosed to all past purchasers as well as to all future purchasers of Levi jeans, the probable health hazards that confront the consumer by using this jeans.

       We are in the process of finishing a documentary on the Levi victims. The documentary consists of interviews of some of the victims, and of the doctors who have treated them. The doctors will discuss the examinations and tests they have administered and the medical opinions they have formed.

       One of the doctors will discuss his personal examination of over eight hundred children born to the Levi victims while they were employed by Levi and the birth defects he found on said children.

       Once this documentary is finished, we are going to approach your stores and ask them permission to run the documentary on one of the TVs being sold at said store. But that will not be for several weeks in the future.

       If you have any questions, please feel free to call me at the number listed above.