4.13.2006

Feminine hygiene

If you     are a woman and use pads, but especially if you use tampons, 
read  this and pass it on to your friends. For the men receiving this email, please  forward it to your friends, significant others, sisters, mothers, daughters,  etc.).
Thanks!
The next time you buy sanitary pads or tampons, check the labels and 
see whether you spot any of the familiar signs stated in this email.
No wonder so many women in the world suffer from cervical cancer and 
Womb tumors. Have you heard that tampon makers include asbestos in 
tampons?
Why would they do this? Because asbestos makes you bleed more, if 
You bleed more, you're going to need to use more. Why isn't this against the law since asbestos is so dangerous? Because the powers that be, in all their wisdom (not),
did not consider tampons as being ingested, and therefore, didn't 
consider them illegal or dangerous.
 
This month's Essence magazine has a small article about this and 
They mention two manufacturers of a cotton tampon alternative.
The companies are: Organic Essentials @ 1-800-765-6491 and Terra Femme 1-800-755-0212.
 
A woman getting her PhD at University of Colorado at Boulder sent the following:
 
"I am writing this   because women are not being informed about the 
dangers  of something most of us use: tampons. I am taking a class this month and I have been learning a lot about biology and women, including feminine hygiene.
Recently we have learned that tampons are actually dangerous (for other 
reasons than TSS). After learning about this in our class, most of the 
females  wound up feeling angry and upset with the tampon industry, and I for one, I am going to do something about it.
To start, I want to inform everyone I can, and email is the fastest 
way that I know how." HERE IS THE SCOOP: Tampons contain two things that are potentially harmful: Rayon (for absorbency), and dioxin (a chemical used in bleaching the products). The tampon industry is convinced that we, as women, need bleached white products in order to view the product as pure and clean.
The problem here is that the dioxin, which is produced in this
bleaching process, can lead to very harmful problems for a     woman.
Dioxin is potentially carcinogenic (cancer associated) and is toxic 
to the immune and reproductive systems. It has also been linked to 
endometriosis is and lower sperm counts for men. For both sexes, it breaks down the immune system.
Last
September, the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) reported 
that there really is no "acceptable" level of exposure to dioxin given that it is cumulative and slow to disintegrate. The real danger comes from repeated contact(Karen Couppert "Pulling the Plug on the Tampon Industry").
I'd say using about 4-5 tampons a day, five days a month, for 38 
years is"repeated contact", wouldn't you?
Rayon contributes to the danger of tampons and dioxin
because it is 
a     highly
absorbent substance. Therefore, when fibers from the tampons are 
left behind in
the vagina (as usually occurs), it creates a breeding ground for the 
dioxin. It also stays in a lot longer then it would with just cotton tampons. This is also the reason why TSS (toxic shock syndrome)
occurs.
WHAT ARE THE     ALTERNATIVES?
Using feminine hygiene products that aren't bleached and that are 
all cotton.
Other feminine hygiene products (pads/napkins) contain dioxin as 
well,but they are not nearly as dangerous. So, what can you do if you can't give up using tampons? Use tampons that are made
from 100% UNBLEACHED. 
Unfortunately, there are very few companies that make these safe tampons. They are usually only found in health food stores.
Countries all over the world (Sweden, Germany, British Columbia, 
etc.)  have demanded a switch to this afer tampon, while the U.S. has decided to keep us in the dark about it.
In 1989, activists in England mounted a campaign     against chlorine 
bleaching. Six weeks and America is not #1 in every arena. 50,000 letters later, the makers of sanitary products switched to oxygen bleaching, one of the green methods available MS magazine, May/June 1995).
 
 WHAT TO DO NOW:
 
Tell people. Everyone. Inform them. We are being manipulated by this industry and the government, let's do something about it! Please write to the companies: Tampax(Tambrands); Playtex; O.B.; Kotex. All the 800 numbers are listed on the boxes.
Let them know that we demand a safe product! ALL COTTON UNBLEACHED 
TAMPONS...

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