Camryn, you wrote the story, you made some strong accusations about an industry that employs tens of thousands and serves millions more, and you didn't research the facts. When countered with with facts and contrary opinion, well, I think your reaction is best described as 'WAH!'

You ask for counter documentation, here comes:

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Deaths due to cancer in the population of dry cleaners is not any more signifigant than in the rest of the working population. Factoring in that 'in the good old days' many more cleaners would drink and smoke more than they do now, its highly likely that more folks smoked and drank themselves to cancer than from cleaning with perc. But then again, all the science and studies for the past 100 years have been INCONCLUSIVE, so there is no way to know one way or the other if PERC is the killer you claim it to be.

So, you want to ban or eliminate all dangers equal to or greater than perc? Well, society had best give up drinking, smoking, eating, and fornicating, as all those activities have higher risks of death associated with them. We should ban Doctors and their practice because MEdical mis-diagnosis causes more deaths. We should ban dispensing pharmacueticals because the folks in the white jackets cause more deaths by handing out the wrong pills. You can find this and more RELATIVE threats worse thatn dry cleaning here:

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All I requested of you is to have put your staements into proper perspective compared to real threats to a person. But you focused on the purely negative and pushed the pendulum too far one way, so some of us pushed it back.

One might ask, 'How deadly is your pen?' Fear mongering stories such as yours does much to smear an industry beased on hard work, responsibility, and lawfulness. Your words, based on junk science or poor research, does more harm to honest hard working people than tanker loads of perc dumped into oceans will ever do. You based your article on your own personal feelings and your own (flawed) observations. You could have spent a few hours researcing a balanced story and stuck to balanced facts, but you didn't. Suck it up.

I'm likely one of the folks you Googled, and you likely found that I was a dry cleaner in a previous career. I hope you also found that I've run a tire recycling company that has now cleaned up over 10 million waste tires, I run an ewaste recycling business that processes hundreds of tons at standards higher than the producers of the Electronics themselves expect of the recycling industry. You may have found that I'm also a writer for various magazines, except that my editors standards demand that my articles contain researched facts, or express my opinions as my opinions. I hope that you also found that I'm a web 2.0 communications consultant who helps advertising agencies and PR firms use web 2.0 communications tools like this blog to tell a complete and full story, and then let the world judge for themselves.

Point, and counter point. If you pick up a pen, be prepared that those who do not agree with you will pick up a pen and state their opinions in return.

Camryn,

I am not sure what is happening here. You wrote a highly inflammatory blog and a number of people rebutted your thoughts and personal opinions regarding drycleaning.

There is one response shown by your counter and I believe most people would like to read the others yet you say there was only one response.

You painted the entire industry with a mighty wide brush. Percholoroethylene is not the only solvent used by drycleaners. Among others are Liquid Carbon Dioxide, high flash-point hydrocarbon, a silicone solvent similar to what is used for breast implants, a glycol solvent and, of course, water.

In fact I replied and commented to your blog and suppose you googled me also. I can assure you I have no dog in the fight just a mere columnist and consultant to the industry. I think if you went to a modern drycleaning plant you could have an entirely different opinion rather than some of the used up plants I have been exposed to in the past fifty years.

It appears you blog is to attract the alarmists and professional litigants to continue to feed the law firms listed on your blog site. I agree with what Darcy said about ethics in reporting and writing for the general public to read. I am sure you are a nice person that simply got bit in the butt by the blog a lot of drycleaners read and took offense, and you have noticed they can be a vocal group.

I am sure you may have had an itch when you retrieved your garments from the cleaners and I also suspect that the cleaners was not a professional and competent cleaner of textiles. My dog (big dog) is with me most of the time and I frequently sneeze when around him but I know it is harmless and if any of us lived in a hermetically sealed bubble it would be a pretty dull, and dirty life.

Everett Childers

I'll be your proof! I'm still here, alive and kicking with no health affects. I have no health affects after 28 years of working directly with perc. You complain that you got a rash from wearing a garment that was dry cleaned. Imagine 70lbs of garments sopping wet with perc where you are taking that 70lbs of sopping wet garments with your hands and transferring that from one machine to another. Then doing it again 12 - 15 times a day, six days a week, for 28 years! Now that is one heck of a lot of over exposure to perc, wouldn't you have to agree?

But that's not all! There's more! Imagine filling 5 gallon buckets with perc and then soaking down the entire floor with it using a mop twice a week! Yep! Mopping floors with perc! Imagine the mass exposure to that! But there is even more! Imagine cleaning out the bottom of stills that filled with perc and while it is hot! Talk about super exposure!

Now after all that and after 28 years of it, I shouldn't only be dead! I should have been dead at least a 1,000 times over if what the junk science says about perc had any truth to it!

I started at the age of 15 working in a dry cleaners back in 1975. From that point I was mopping floors with perc, cleaning out stills filled with perc, and handling sopping and wet loads of garments dripping wet with perc! I met my wife who was working in a dry cleaners which she started at the age of 16 and spent 26 years working in the business. We have 3 grown kids who were basically born in the back of a dry cleaners. My wife worked up until the day of delivery with all 3 of our children. From the time they were brought home from being born which was 3 days later they were brought to work with us and spent the entite 10 - 12 hour days in the back of the cleaners around the cleaning machines until they were old enough to start school! All 3 of them! None of them have any health affects from the pregnencies, nor after spending 6 days a week of the first 5 years of their lives living in a cleaners 10 - 12 hours a day. They are 23, 24 and 30 years old today and all 3 are perfectly healthy along with my wife and myself!

Based on junk science consumer reports wrote an article some years back where they were claiming that if you were to take one pair of pants and one sweater to the dry cleaners, once a week, for a period of FOURTY YEARS....you "could" potentially devolop some type of liver cancer from that! REALLY???? Well lets see, if you start out at the young age of 21 that would put you at 61 years old where you "could" potentially develop some form of liver cancer! WOW!!! Honey, the food you eat alone could kill you many times over long before reaching 61 years of age! Google aspertine for all you diet soda drinkers and see the health affects that has which are PROVEN that our government denies and refuses to do anything about all for the sake of the big mighty dollar!

But lets get back to the junk science report about 2 garments per week for 40 years! That would be 104 garments per year times 40 years = 4,160 garments!

Lets compare that to the number of garments I handled over the 28 years being in the dry cleaning business. And a;lso remember, that 2 garments per week were two garments picked up by the consumer AFTER they were completely processed and dried and where the consumer never worked inside a dry cleaning plant.

To be conservative, I processed an average of 500 garments per DAY, six days a week, for 28 years! That is THREE THOUSAND PER WEEK x 52 weeks = 156,000 garments PER YEAR x 28 years = FOUR MILLION THREE HUNDRED SIXTY EIGHT THOUSAND garments! That's 4,368,000 that I have been exposed to first hand inside a dry cleaning plant over 28 years! Divide that 4,160 into 4,368,000 and that comes to 1,050.

Now if that junk science was even remotely close to having any truth to it, then based on that study alone, I should have devoloped some form of liver cancer at least a 1,050 times over now! I've been out of the dry cleaning business for 9 years now. So now it is 37 years since being exposed to perc in mass quanity for 28 of those years! Oh, and I use to drink practically everyday for about 20 of those years while working in the dry cleaning business and I've been a smoker since 16 years of age and I smoke 2 - 3 packs per day! I'm 49 now. Should have been dead 20 years ago at least based on the junk science the do-gooders have used to make false claims about perc!

BTW...If perc is so bad, then how is it that one of the best childrens burn hospitals in the country used perc to treat major burns on patients??? Yep! It's true! They used perc to treat burns! It is one of the best known chemicals to treat a burn with. I've used it many times on myself and several times on my children when they burned themselves from the hot steam pipes in the cleaners. It INSTANTLY stops the pain from the burning, it will prevent the burn from blistering, and it will prevent the burned area from ever scaring!

I've cleaned with it, mopped floors with it, cleaned out hot stills with it, washed my hands with it, put on my body to treat burns...and after all that I'm still here and I have no health affects of any kind! None of kids nor my wife have any health affects. We are not alergic to anything, none of us take any kind of medication for anything. We are all perfectly healthy and both sides of our familes have long history of health problem which none of them have ever worked in a dry cleaners!

Here is a great article that was written by one of the most knowledgeable professionals in the industry. It may help you with a little better understanding on this topic:

Taking the Case for Perc to Court
By Stan Golomb
This article was orginally published in the March 1996 edition of National Clothesline


United States of America
The Circuit Court
of Public Opinion
for the Consumers of America



The Drycleaners of America, )
Plaintiff )

)
vs. )

)
The EPA, Greenpeace, )
and those groups )
who would banish )
perchloroethylene, )
Defendant )


Proposing a motion to cease and desist harassment of the drycleaning industry

Let me present a case for the drycleaning solvent known as perchloroethylene, hereafter referred to as perc. I will prove to you that there is no logical reason for the defendants to demand that the use of perc be discontinued. One must examine their motivation and unproven claims that perc is a danger to the people who work with this product and the public who benefits from the clean garments this product provides.

Drycleaners in Germany are now processing 70,000 pounds of textiles per drum of perc. Drycleaning the same amount of fabric calls for some 7,000 gallons of pure, filtered perc that is flushed through the garments on a continuous basis. The solvent from each load is drained and then extracted. There would normally be a holdup of about 35 gallons per 1,000 pounds of fabric when we start the reclamation and drying process of the garments.

By the time we have finished reclamation and drying, we find we have to replace only about 96 ounces of perc to make up for the lost solvent. Most of the lost solvent is retained in the residue of the constant distillation of the perc with some loss in the filters. Practically none of the solvent is left in the garments. This is a requirement for processing in Germany.

Perc lends itself to easy distillation at relatively low temperatures and between distillation and filtration, drycleaning solvent can be kept at maximum clarity and purity. When the still is drained, there is some solvent held up along with the non volatile residue and the small amount held up in the filter powder or filter cartridges. The waste material is stored in hazardous waste containers for removal by authorized waste cartage companies.

A short history of the evolution of fabric cleaning

It has been documented that wool was made into clothing and was being washed 8,000 years ago in Mesapotamia. 7,827 years later, a Frenchman by the name of Jean-Baptiste Jolly was alleged to have accidentally discovered that he could clean garments using camphene. His discovery took place in the year 1823. That discovery precipitated the term "drycleaning."

The process gradually went from camphene and spirits of turpentine to a combination of petroleum solvents. The original plants were highly flammable and were restricted to industrial zones. When 140-degree F. petroleum solvent came into being, this reduced the zoning restrictions.

Hotels, valet shops and tailor shops were in search of small machines that could be used on the premises. This led to the use of a solvent known as carbon-tetrachloride. Carbon-tet was considered highly toxic but not flammable. The garments were air dried after extraction. Even though carbon-tet was considered toxic, I know many operators who worked with this solvent after World War II with apparently no ill effect.

Finally, about 1945, perchloroethylene hit the market. Package plants started opening up everywhere. Some of these plants had no perc reclamation facilities and operators were exposed to heavy doses of perc fumes. If it did affect the operators who inhaled these heavy concentrations of perc fumes, I never heard of a health problem.

In the early 1950s, I serviced hundreds of plants in the New York City area that used nine-pound machines sold under the trade name of Sec-O-Matic. These cleaning machines were top-load washers with agitators. After draining and extracting most of the solvent from the garments, the clothes were hung in an open cabinet with an exhaust fan to circulate air through the garments.

From 50 pounds per gallon to 700 pounds per gallon in 45 years

There was no solvent recovery after extraction. Perc was cheap and the best mileage a cleaner could expect was 50 pounds per gallon of perc. Compare this to the state of the art plants in the U.S. that are now cleaning 700 pounds to a gallon of perc.

If perc is a serious health hazard, this would be evidenced by the Workers' Compensation insurance policies. This led me to call Peter Ruden, vice president of American Insurance Agency of Illinois. His company insures the majority of all drycleaners in the Midwest with its bailee and workers' compensation policies. He is also active in drycleaning affairs and held the position of president of the Chicago Cleaner's Guild for many terms. His company works with the Illinois State Fabricare Association.

I asked Peter for comparison rates for worker's compensation insurance between the drycleaning industry and other fields. Insurance actuaries study the past performance of claims and risk factors of every industry. From this, they establish the workers' comp rates.

Most drycleaners use perc as their principal solvent and perc is a known killer, according to those who would ban the product. My conclusion is that if perc is indeed a deadly chemical, the workers' comp insurance rates would be out of sight.

Insurance companies live in the real world and use historical evidence in setting their rates. They are the ones who have to pay out hard cash and they make sure the premiums charged are in excess of their claims.

Peter gave me the latest rates that became effective on January 1, 1996.

You will be interested in seeing how perc compares to gas stations and restaurants.

Gas station employees under Code 8380 are rated at $4.95 per hundred dollars of payroll.
Restaurant employees under Code 7341 are rated at $3.40 per hundred dollars of payroll.
Drycleaning employees, Code 2586, are rated at $2.58 per hundred dollars of payroll.

The rates for laundry operations are higher than the rates for drycleaning plants.

So what does all this say? It says that based on claims and experience over many years, the insurance companies consider drycleaning plants as a relatively safe environment and don't consider perc a health hazard at all.

Drycleaning plants in Germany produce 70,000 pounds of cleaning per drum of perc. A drum of perc contains 51.6 gallons. 70,000 pounds of cleaning is now standard in Germany and it should be the eventual goal in the United States.

We should not be wetcleaning garments that would clean and be finished better, safer and far more economically in perc. Perc is one of the best degreasing agents known and a great many clothing stains are grease and oil related.

Not only are perc and the detergents used in cleaning plants in America producing outstanding soil removal, but the solvent is perhaps the greatest recyclable compound known to man.

One gallon of perc will process some 1,356.59 pounds of fabrics

If you divide this by the most popular size drycleaning machine, it would equate to 38.8 loads of 35 pounds each for just one gallon of perc. One single load of 35 pounds would require only .258 percent of one gallon, or 3.4 ounces, to clean a 35-pound load.

And that, members of the jury, is the future.

What do you think happens to that 3.4 ounces of perc? Where do the 3.4 ounces go? Are they lost with the still residue or spent filter powder or stripped cartridges?

The minute amount of perc that is still contained in still residue or spent powder goes in hazardous waste containers. But for argument's sake, let's assume that these few ounces stay in the plant as a hazard to the employees and evaporate during the finishing process. Is this a danger to anyone? I think not. Could this possibly be a danger to the outside world? Of course not.

I realize that most perc plants in the country are not getting 70,000 pounds, but most are using dry-to- dry, closed-circuit machines and are getting from 30,000 to 40,000 pounds per drum of perc. This should meet all safety standards, especially since nobody ever proved that perc, used in a controlled atmosphere, is harmful.

Most up-to-date plants in America are now using about 6.8 ounces of perc to clean a 35-pound load. We sure have come a long way from the days when we only got 2,500 pounds to a drum and then 5,000 pounds when we installed reclaimers. Now we're up to about 35,000 pounds to a drum. I have known scores of people who worked at the 2,500-pound-per-drum level and are enjoying good health in their senior years.

Now, after 8,000 years, we seem to have a new product and process to solve all our environmental problems -- water. Water has always been around. That's how people cleaned fabrics since the beginning of time. So what's so new about wetcleaning?

In 1947, when I was attending the National Institute of Drycleaning (now the International Fabricare Institute) three-month General Course, we spent a lot of time learning the mysteries of wetcleaning. Not washing, you understand. Even back then, our instructors made a point to have us call this water process wetcleaning instead of drycleaning. We were told never to refer to this process as washing but to always use the term wetcleaning when explaining to a customer why a garment had shrunk. Wetcleaning still shrinks clothes.

At NID, we learned how to use all the oxidizing and reducing bleaches. We learned how to prepare digestive baths with controlled temperature. And we did a lot of hand-washing of men's pants that were stiff at the knees from perspiration.

An hour to press four pairs of pants

Most of you reading this article don't know about pants-stretching machines and the shrinkage problems we had, even when we wetcleaned pants by hand, brushed with neutral soaps and rinsed, extracted and air dried. And you certainly don't know about the finishing problems we had. It took an hour to properly finish four pairs of pants. The cotton pockets and waist bands had to be hand ironed and the pants legs had to be lined up, by the inseam, as the only guide for putting in the crease. After wetcleaning, there were no creases in wool pants left to follow.

The charge system and special detergents that could carry minute particles of water as a co-solvent were introduced to the industry about 1950. This revolutionary process removed perspiration and water soluble stains and eliminated the need to wetclean most pants.

I'm reading all the articles about the great success with wetcleaning and reports that some plants are wetcleaning as many as 30 percent of all their garments and reporting satisfactory results. They are doing this to comply with the public's opinion of ecological drycleaning. Don't you think these cleaners, who are praising wetcleaning, would rather dryclean most of these garments? I think they would if it were not for the public's belief in the propaganda that created an outrage of using environmentally unsafe products.

Caving in to the environmentalists

The industry has caved in to the claims of environmentalists who loudly condemn perc and claim that it's killing babies.

Greenpeace has a stake in this battle. They need a cause to scare people into donating funds to their organization. They chose to go after chlorine and picked the drycleaning industry as an easy target. The public is familiar with drycleaners and their scare tactics has brought unnecessary havoc on our industry.

If our politicians and industry leaders would stand up for the safety of perc and not cave in to the hysterics of these self-serving groups, we could continue to improve our methods and dryclean billions of pounds of fabrics and keep the public clean and impeccably well groomed.

Don't concern yourself with the welfare of Greenpeace. They will just find another cause and continue to raise funds in the neighborhood of $60 million a year. In my opinion, they are mercenaries and, like mercenaries, they fight for money, adventure, and power to control others and the cause be damned.

If we stand together and defeat all the untruths about the hazards of perc, Greenpeace and their kind will quickly find another cause, perhaps the problems of waste water, which could be an offshoot of our caving in to their demands. Then they'd offset that by finding alternative methods to avoid the use of water for cleaning purposes and we'd be forced back into perc or some exotic chemical that would raise the price for cleaning a suit or dress considerably.

From perc to water to perc

Let's examine water as a replacement for perc. It takes about 70 gallons of water to wash 35 pounds of fabric. That constitutes 8,960 ounces of water to the 3.4 ounces of perc to clean the same amount of fabric.

Using perc and filtration, a plant will flush at least 200 gallons of clean solvent through the garments and will wind up reclaiming all but 3.4 ounces. What other product exists where you can recycle the use of hundreds of gallons of anything and wind up recovering all but 3.4 ounces?

Water has to go somewhere and it presently goes into the sewer systems of the country. The engineer in charge of the sanitary district of a group of communities in my area tells me that they are at 95 percent capacity. What do you think will happen if all the cleaners in this area were to wetclean instead of dryclean?

And what about the states that periodically suffer from water shortages? What is Greenpeace's answer to that?

In Illinois, there is a law requiring steam carpet cleaners to dispose of their waste water in special depots and if they fail to comply, they face heavy fines and jail. Is there any difference between the water coming from laundry washers and the water coming from dirty carpeting?

How long would it take the bureaucrats who write mandates to come up with the need to purify the waste water before disposal to the sewer system?

It takes 2,000 gallons of water to wetclean 1,000 pounds of clothes. That same 1,000 pounds can be cleaned with about three quarts of perc.

Partners?

IFI, NCA, FLARE, and the Federation of Korean Drycleaners Association all signed a partnership with Greenpeace and the others to encourage and support the development of programs to help clothing care professionals evaluate wetcleaning for a greater range of garments and to adopt and provide wetcleaning services that meet their needs and will assist those presently in the clothes care industry to survive and prosper in the face of heightened regulatory pressures.

This is a one way partnership

I read Bill Seitz's viewpoint on signing the alliance with Greenpeace, The Center of Neighborhood Technology, The Union of Needletrades and Textile Employees, and the Massachusetts Toxics Use Reduction Institute. Here's Bill Seitz's documented viewpoint:

"The parties do not agree on many of the critical issues to sign off on the Professional Wet Cleaning Partnership. The reasons for hesitancy are as follows:

The parties do not agree on many of the critical issues regarding the safety and dangers of perchloroethylene.
The main emphasis for our industry is to wetclean as many garments as possible, reducing the amount of perc used. Will reduction be an acceptable solution?
There was no guarantee that the negative publicity that the environmentalists are releasing will necessarily cease or even be reduced."
My opinion is that you can't form a partnership with people who are your enemy and out to destroy your credibility. Greenpeace even declared that they refuse to agree to stop their negative publicity.

Regardless of the reduction of perc, I feel the environmentalists will continue their lies to scare the public and continue to raise funds for their present cause because this is their lifeline to keep their jobs and income and power.

I disagree with my good friend, Bill Seitz, that the industry should wetclean as many garments as possible and reduce the amount of perc used. He goes on to say, "Will reduction be an acceptable solution?"

Of course not.

I don't think the negative publicity will be reduced, not as long as the public can be convinced that perc is a hazard to their health and environmental groups can use this propaganda to continue to solicit funds for their cause.

The hazards of perc used in a controlled situation has never been proven, other than in laboratory tests by administering large doses of perc into tiny rodents.

If there was a carcinogenic problem with perc, this would have been proven over the past 50 years by statistics of people who worked with perc in heavy doses, starting in 1945, some 50 years ago. That includes me (I'm now 71), Bill Seitz and Ray Colucci, who are my contemporaries, and thousands of others who have worked in areas of heavy, air-laden perc and somehow survived.

The enemies of perc would hate to see perc usage discontinued for any reason because they would have to find a new cause. Ask yourself what motivates them to fight progress and clamor for the drycleaners of the world to discontinue perc and ban chlorine. What reason can the Needle Trades union have for wanting perc discontinued? Perhaps they'll answer me with some cooked-up excuse to take the place of their real motivation. Speaking of motivation, what motivated me to write this piece?

I'll tell you. I think we're fighting a bunch of self-serving bureaucrats and mercenaries and I hate to see them win. I spent my life in the drycleaning business and it hurts me to see our industry hijacked by people who never worked around perc but have taken it upon themselves to be saviors of the public at large.

Fifty years ago, at the end of World War II, ours was a great country with freedom for all and the opportunity to pursue success and happiness. I fought for that cause with the U.S. Marines during World War II. Now the very freedom I fought for is being eroded in many ways by a government of bureaucrats who mandate all kinds of regulations resulting in business paying a terrific price.

We, the small business people of America, are the backbone of our country

We are the producers of America and provide most of the jobs and taxes required to keep the government going and growing and growing. Those who don't produce dictate policy and write mandates to give themselves and their agencies more power at the expense of the producers of this country.

The same goes for the environmental groups who go from cause to cause and take satisfaction in raising funds for their causes to save endangered species, the ozone layer, the whales, the spotted owls, wetlands, and any other cause they can use to keep raising funds.

They may save all these things but they are killing off another species. They are killing off the producers, the hard working, risk-taking entrepreneurs who supply more jobs than any group in America. We are the people who have made this country great.

They are the counter-productive do-gooders who smugly convince themselves they are doing good deeds. They are inadvertently taking the incentive away from the most needed people in America. We should seriously analyze their motives and prove that they aren't what they would have the public believe.

These groups do not produce products or services but simply tell others what to do and get their funds and power without being productive members of society. This aggravates me and I'll do anything I can to see it changed.

If we cave in to these parasites, we will have lost another battle against freedom and truth and everyone will suffer. The consumer they claim to protect will wind up paying higher prices for drycleaning and a poorer quality of cleaning.

And with that as my closing statement, ladies and gentlemen of the jury of public opinion, I rest my case.

I guess everytime my tongue itches after I eat a Big Mac, I should run back to the Mcdonalds I bought it from an form some kind of protest out in the parking lot. God knows that everytime I read the paper and the ink comes off in my hand I should run out into the street and shriek and foam at the mouth too! The rebubtle to your blog is akin to someone protecting a child from sinister harm. The moral of the story i guess is: Don't underestimate a dry cleaner, he just might stand up to you and give it back to you.

Here is a link to the Nordic Study of cancer among 46,000 drycleaner workers exposed to perc:
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It proves that there is no correlation between cancer and exposure to perc.
I’m living proof. Have been exposed to perc for over 50 years.
First as a metal worker (metal molds degreasing) and later as a drycleaner.
I have yet to see the insides of a hospital as a patient.

Camryn,
I just read this after hearing about it from various sources. I don't need to tell you life long stories of working in the industry or facts being pro or con about things you have read. I feel the other responders have done all that needs to be done in relaying these stories.

My two cents worth has nothing to do with dry cleaning but your source of information. Rather than searching and reading anything that pops up, you should know that while the EPA published the questionable information you referenced, they also recently approved perc as a substitute for some other chemicals that they judged worse in the SNAP program.

If this chemical is considered 'bad' in one chapter of their documents and then being recommended in another chapter, I'd say our tax dollars are being wasted in even having the EPA.

While looking at the SNAP program (I hope you will take the time?) you will see a chemical called n-propyl bromide. This chemical was also approved by EPA and is currently being introduced to the dry cleaning industry as a replacement for perc. Look that chemical up and see what it's health effects are.

Now, due to the fact that EPA approved both of these chemicals for use in precision cleaning and at this point will not even comment on the use of nPB for dry cleaning again proves that our government is almost comical.

I'll give you another example of the creditability of EPA decisions. Every day, you use products in your home that contain different chemicals that are harmful and most you know about. The next time you shampoo your hair and use conditioner understand that a couple the ingredients used in those products is a chemical that is also used in one of the alternative drycleaning solvents. Do a little searching for the word siloxane or decamethylcyclopentasiloxane (D5). Look for a study done in California to determine the toxicity of this chemical for use in the dry cleaning industry. This study's last sentence says "For these reasons, OEHHA cannot make a finding at this time that D5 is non-toxic." Why is the Canadian government seeking to ban this family of chemicals?

I'll end this so you can research the items I mentioned. When you are done, ask yourself if you should stop shampooing your hair. Ask yourself what fumes are you breathing while your bathroom is all steamed up. Ask yourself why does the government allow the giant corporations to sell this chemical to the public without question, yet question it as a replacement solvent for perc in the dry cleaning industry.

Your shortfall was to read a document from the EPA that has no relevance to reality. They simply produce reports and documents to insure their piece of the budget stays viable. Small industries such as dry cleaners have no means to finance lobbyist as the large corporations do. You have made judgments from information you did not understand.

You have based your attack on your own reasoning after experiencing a rash. Your reasoning was the rash was caused by the dry cleaning process used on your garments. What did you base this on?

You challenged us to prove the 'safe' properties of perc. You based your opinion on studies done with mice and rats. We base our confidence on our own personal human testing that has been done for over 60 years. The EPA cannot counter this proof.

Camryn,
Quite a hot bed we have here. I am a textile cleaner. I hope you don't discredit my comments because I have a vested interest in the topic, as you have alluded to doing in your response.

You have stumbled upon an industry that is dominated by small operators (sorry, not much available in tort claims here). We have no national chains. The "corporate" giants that have tried to enter this industry have, so far, all failed. Because of the very nature of our size, we have been an easy target for regulators to attack in order to drive agendas, put feathers in their caps, and perpetuate jobs. The media has gladly followed suit.

As an industry we tried to fight the government's attack on us with a naive approach that logic, common sense and empirical evidence would prevail. We should have noticed long ago that we were not going to win and put our tails between our legs and ran. The only problem was that there was no clear direction for us to run in. The regulators have already said they don't like the most viable alternatives. The only two "approved" alternatives (CO2 and water) have their challenges as welll. CO2 is cost prohibitive for most operators and, while I am a 100% wet cleaner and reject very few garments (the same or less than when I was a solvent cleaner), it is not a solution for everybody until garment manufacturers get regulated as much as dry cleaners have to require them to make garments designed for wet cleaning. So, I ask you, what are we to do while we sit here taking sucker punches?

Two decades of dry cleaner bashing has gotten old, which is why you see this level of repsonse to the opinioins you have written.

Dry cleaners are not the evil empires you and other media outlets make us out to be. In fact, if you want to support the underdog, we are it. We live in the communities we serve, meaning all our money gets reinvested right back in to our local economy. We provide jobs in the community. We donate to every boy and girl asking for donations for their school or 4H or swim team, even when we don't have the money to do it, because we care. We collect and clean tens of thousands of jackets in Coats for Kids programs all across the country. We gladly open our doors after hours on a Friday night when the bridesmaid or police officer calls us at home because they forgot to pick up their dress or uniform. We have battled against all odds to survive. I say again, if you want to support the underdog, throw us a bone and stop beating us up. This industry is made up of some of the kindest and hardest working people in America. It would do you good to get to know a few. You might even want to try their services, you might like how it makes you look.

Camryn,
If you truly want to understand the current knowledge on perc, I suggest you review the research by the American Council on Science and Health. I quote their website:

"The American Council on Science and Health (ACSH) is a consumer education consortium concerned with issues related to food, nutrition, chemicals, pharmaceuticals, lifestyle, the environment and health. ACSH is an independent, nonprofit, tax-exempt organization.

The nucleus of ACSH is a board of 350 physicians, scientists and policy advisors - experts in a wide variety of fields-who review the Council's reports and participate in ACSH seminars, press conferences, media communications and other educational activities.

ACSH was founded in 1978 by a group of scientists who had become concerned that many important public policies related to health and the environment did not have a sound scientific basis. These scientists created the organization to add reason and balance to debates about public health issues and bring common sense views to the public."

If you review the real evidence about perc, I'm sure you will understand why cleaners across the country get riled when unsubstantiated supposition is repeated as fact.

I have read this blog, and the comments to it, with interest. I don't know anything about Perc. I have not done any research and only know what I read here on both sides of the issue. Several years ago, I represented a buyer of a dry cleaners operation that could not sell the his property because of ground and ground water contamination. That may be apples and oranges to this issue. I have represented people who smoked and imbibed their whole lives to a fare thee well without consequences. Good genetics trumps good living eight days a week. Again, this may have nothing to do with what we are talking about here.

What I found interesting was the idea that Camryn, or the law firm she wrote this blog for, is seeking "professional plaintiffs." This is a phenomena that I have only seen in the last 8-10 of the 26 years that I have practiced law. It is the prospective client who wants me to know at the outset that he/she is not a "lawsuit type." My typical reply is that if I thought that they were, I would not represent them. I have too much to do, and so do all of the plaintiffs' attorneys that I deal with. Juries give money to people that they think are deserving and every trial attorney knows that.

I hope that all of y'all that commented are right. Regardless, the debate is important. But for trial attorneys, the tobacco industry would still have executives testifying under oath that smoking does not cause lung cancer. Unlike what you have been told, trial attorneys generally have a fierce desire to represent the underdog. I will study this further and weigh in again.

Great article Camryn! The people who are objecting to your article are the ones making money on the subject. They obviously don't care about their customers or public health as much as they do about their profits. They couldn't sell their arguments to a class of 5th graders. Darcy Moen seems to think that she wins the argument with statements like "there is no way to know one way or the other if PERC is the killer". Is she crazy? No thanks, Darcy, leave the PERC out my life. Thank heavens there are trial attorneys out there to protect the public health when companies put profits before people. I run a chemical free termite control company in Honolulu and we face the same spin that these dry cleaners make. Pesticides cause many cancers but as Darcy gleefully and righteously points out about Perc, it is hard to prove that a woman with breast cancer at age 35 got from Perc or Dursban. With public haelth I don'[t care if the dry cleaners employe thousands of workers. And I don't care if pest control companies make profits if they are poisoning the soil around our schools or the air in our homes and class rooms. The voluminous and vitriolic responses highlight one of the great falsehoods that is spun out daily by industries that irresponsibly use chemicals: "you can't prove that it caused this particular illness". No person in their right mind accepts that type of analysis when ingesting something into their body or putting it in the air they breathe. Oh, and by the way, I worked as a research scientist and have a Masters Degree in Physics. You win, Camryn, and they lose.

Wayne, it is obvious that you have swallowed the 'chemical free' kool-aid. Your entire business as 'chemical free termite control' is based on the 'any chemical is a bad chemical' marketing standpoint. Question is, how far do YOU take your marketing environmentalism? Do you wear hemp and bamboo uniforms? Drive bio-diesel powered vehicles? Of course you'd buy into the marketing premise, you have to, or you'd be a hypocrite.

You make your profits by pushing the chemical free alternative. In fact, I wonder if sometimes you have to justify higher prices because of your 'chemical free' services? You too are motivated by the profit motive, so your argument is tainted as well. Stones and glass houses my friend.

As one of the other commenters points out, how does one account for the 100 plus years of HUMAN tests owner/operators of dry cleaning businesses have conducted on themselves while serving society? The incidences of death and cancer is no greater than in the regular non-drycleaning population. You don't rebut that one at all.

While you might have a master's degree in Physics and worked as a research scientist, you are not immune to jumping to conclusions without considering ALL the facts and making errors in judgement based upon information presented or gathered by you. My gender is not what you surmised, Wayne, there is a stem on the apple. Darcy Moen is a MALE. How did your experience as a research scientist and Master's degree miss that fact?

I read both posts with great interest, mostly because I wear lots of dry cleaned clothes because of my work as a personal injury attorney. What really surprises me is the significant response to what would seemingly be a minor issue, raising awareness of a potentially dangerous chemical. If perc is as non-dangerous as all of the commenters suggest, then why has California banned the use of this substance? Why has the EPA stated it has been potentially linked to cancer? Arron Bray claims the EPA has now reversed it's course on perc, but if this happened any time during the last 8 years, that decision means absolutely nothing. Science and knowledge have been devastated thanks to the outgoing administration, so the opinion of the current EPA is meaningless to the debate about perc.

I have a difficult time understanding why people would argue about forcing a potentially dangerous chemical on the population simply because it's not certain how dangerous it is. What if there was a provable 5% chance it causes cancer, would that be a low enough risk to continue using this chemical?What is the harm in informing people perc may cause cancer or other health risks so they can make an informed choice? If we don't know whether this chemical is actually dangerous, it seems silly to say that it must not be dangerous and no further study is needed.

Many commenters claim to have worked in the dry cleaning industry for many years and have no ill side effects, thereby proving perc is not dangerous. However, Camryn had an adverse reaction to perc. If we use the conventional wisdom of the commenters, this proves perc is dangerous because of her adverse reaction, ipso facto. Neither side is absolutely correct, all Camryn was saying is there are concerns raised in the scientific community about perc that people should be aware of, which is why she put links in her post to non-perc dry cleaning. If someone wants to do more research on this issue, the info is linked in her post and they can decide for themselves what to believe. Even if perc is proven to be harmless, I'm pretty sure I'd rather take the risk of being wrong rather than living with the consequences of being right.

I went to the web site of the Drycleaning & Laundry Institute International to see what they say about perc. "Perc's widespread and successful use over more than six decades has shown that it can be stored and used safely in normal drycleaning practice when proper safety precautions are observed." (More ... environmental.html). Obviously, the operative phrase in that quote is "when proper safety precautions are observed." What happens when they are not? The D&LII points out that the industry disagrees with the scientific methodology which led to the EPA classifying perc as a "possible human carcinogen." That is how scientific consensus comes about - through debate. As best I can tell, the debate is far from over on this issue.

To Wayne,
Our point has been perspective. Taken to extreme, you can find danger in anything. Heck, di-hydrogen monoxide, my cleaning sovent of choice, can cause sever burns in its gaseous state and can be lethal in small quantities. Used properly, though, it is absolutely safe and I have no qualms about using it.

I believe both hexavalent chromium (see Erin Brockovich) and nickel are considered probable carcinogens and are used in the manufacturing of stainless steel, the product you make a living on and claim to be "chemical free." Your support of such deadly chemicals seems quite hypocritcal to me based on your comments regarding dry cleaning. I bet accidents in the manufaturing of stainless steel, not even counting all the cancer it has caused, has killed more people than the real or perceived risks of perc. With such disregard to human health and safety for the almight dollar, I call for a ban on stainless steel (actually, I dont, our industry uses it a lot).

That, my friend is perspective. You can make anything out be a killer when taken to an extreme, especially when you use mathematical models that are not based on reality. If we all lived in a "chemical-free" world, you would see the average life spans fall dramatically. All chemicals are not bad. There must be a line drawn somewhere.

As Darcy said, stone and glass houses, my friend.

To Devon,
For full disclosure, I come with a strong bias against you and other injury lawyers. Your industry, combined with the liberal judges in California and a bogus work comp claim nearly put me out of business. I won't go in to details, but it was a nightmare I am still trying to recover from.

Please read my previous comment to Wayne regarding perspective. You ask if a proven 5% chance of causing cancer was acceptable? My answer would be absolutely not. I wouldn't even come close to the stuff if it were that dangerous. If empirical data showed no health risks and mathematical models showed .0075% increase in risk, I'm okay with it. You, obviously, are not. But, then again, you make a living out of making a mountain out of an ant hill, when it suits you.

You need to re-think your comments about the conventional wisdom of the commentators regarding Camryn's rash. You claimed we criticized her for taking an experience and surmising fact from it, yet we are doing the same thing. A big difference here is that with Camryn it was one solitary experience that could have come from any number of sources. It could be off-gassing of formaldehyde used in the manufacturing of the garment, it could have been something she ate or drank, it could have been from her dog or cat or her neighbors dog or cat, it could have been from the cleaners. We don't even know what solvent her cleaners used. Wouldn't it be funny to find out the cleaners did not use perc? The cleaners experience, on the other hand, comes from repeated exposures to the solvent by hundreds of thousands of owners all over the world. The sample size of the dry cleaners experience is a bit more signficant than the sample size of one individuals solitary rash taken to an extreme interpretation.

Camryn is doing more than just "exposing concerns raised by the scientific community." Her headline reads "How Deadly is Your Dry Cleaning?" In perspective of real and perceived risks, her headline is a little strong. Sensationalism to line her pockets at the expense of many law abiding, hard working people.

Perspective is all this insignificant little textile cleaner asks for.

Guys,

I really appreciate all of this great discourse, and have to agree with Pete Mackey. We need thoughtful debate about both the economic and health impacts of using/not using Perc (or any controversial chemicals we expose workers and customers to). Our collective personal anecdotal observations are useful in this discussion, but are by no means scientific or conclusive in terms of proof.

If they were, there'd be no way to reconcile the facts: some people have been in contact with Perc all their lives and have observed no ill health effects, while others who've done the same believe they have been made very ill as a direct result.

I am not saying this without some "anecdotal" observation of this. Dozens and dozens of former drycleaning industry employees, principals, and their family members have contacted InjuryBoard attorneys over the years with complaints about serious illnesses (rare cancers, nervous system disorders, birth defects, and skin conditions) that they believe were a result of their exposure to Perc.

That's not scientific proof either, but it may help balance these anecdotal observations. If it's potentially unsafe, let's push for more scientific studies while looking for alternatives that can be shown to be safe and effective.

As some of you have pointed out, the discovery and development of Drycleaning was a big innovation and leap forward for the clothes cleaning industry and its customers, and drycleaning has created the livelihood of thousands of people for many years.

In general, technical innovation, research and development and safety advances have led to overall product improvement, job creation and competitive advantage.

Why stop here if there is a potential risk? Why not keep exploring better, safer, more innovative and effective products or techniques? It's innovation that has made our country an economic powerhouse in the last century, in my opinion.

To Devon Glass,
Slow down a bit and read rather than sacn over what is being said.
#1-I did not say EPA approved Perc for Dry Cleaning, or as you put it "Reversed their decision."

I said that under the SNAP program, a program that has nothing to do with dry cleaners, they approved the use of perc along with another chemical (that is being offered to the dry cleaning industry as a replacement for perc) as safer than current chemicals used in precision cleaning processes.

#2-My whole point was to enlighten the readers who care that the EPA is a very complicated organization (typical of our great government)where the right hand doesn't know what the left hand is doing. Taking their published observations and judgments as being correct is very short sighted on the readers part.

Does washing your body with a chemical that studies have proven might have effects such as disruption of dopaminergic pathways causing adverse health impacts on the nervous system (e.g., possible psychological imbalance)not have meaning? Now, there are dry cleaners cleaning garments in this chemical which is odorless and difficult to dry from the garments.

Why don't you guys jump on the manufacturers of these personal hygiene products? No, you would rather jump on a small industry that is compiled of small businesses with limited revenues that are going to be forced out of business because they cannot afford to purchase a new machine to use an alternative solvent.

The EPA made their recommendation regarding what they viewed as safe replacements, CO2 and wet cleaning. A CO2 system is $150,000 to $200,000. Most cleaners in this country do not have annual revenues of that. You are correct. This small industry will get defensive when you are challenging their means of making a living.

In respopnse to Devon Glass who said: 'Many commenters claim to have worked in the dry cleaning industry for many years and have no ill side effects, thereby proving perc is not dangerous. However, Camryn had an adverse reaction to perc.'

Darcy replies: Did Camryn have a reaction to Perc? You sir do not know proper dry cleaning procedure. Any quality dry cleaner uses a detergent added to their solvent to break up surface tension of the liquid and penetrate fibers better for improved cleaning, stain and soil removal. Perc on its own is hypoallergenic, but detergents can cause reaction in SOME folks. I am more inclined to believe soap caused her reation. Again, unless Camryn was willing to subject herself to an allergy test, we won't know.

There are so many folks who think dry cleaning is a dark and mysterious art, yet so few have ever asked for a tour of the back room and requested first hand knowledge. Like your law libraries sir, unless you immerse yourself and study, ignorance leads one to wrong conclusions. All we cleaners have ever asked is full, fair, and open evaluation of our methods, but to date such hasn't happened. California ascted on the side of caution, so much so that one may as well ban fornicationg, eating, surfing, driving, flying, and drinking of water (all of which are more dangerous than dry cleaning). So California over reacted. Our industry will live with California's over cautious reaction, but we certainly won't roll over and let the rest of the world needlessly restrict an entire industry.

Camryn -- I would like you to double check something for me please. Did you ask the drycleaner you used if the clothes were drycleaned or wetcleaned? Was it all the garments that made you itch or just one item? Did you notice any static and was the item a natural fiber or manmade?
Sometimes when perc is used without enough detergent or when water is used without enough fabric softner you may get a scratchy hand... not from perc but from a lack of moisture. Same thing that a dry cold winter will do on anyone`s skin, happens to me every cold Chicago winter.
Ralph
Former drycleaner and wetcleaner