Deadly jeans


  • Photographer
    Marika Dee
  • Prize
    Honorable Mention
  • Date of Photograph
    April and May 2012

These photographs show the human cost of sandblasting in the jeans industry in Turkey. Mehmet and Bekir suffer from an incurable and often deadly pulmonary disease called silicosis. They became ill after having worked in sandblasting workshops in Istanbul. The technique of sandblasting which is used to give jeans a worn look has devastating effects on the health of workers.

Story

The photo essay shows the human cost of sandblasting in the jeans industry in Turkey, one of the world’s biggest exporters of jeans. The sandblasting technique is used to give jeans a worn look. Workers use compressors to blow under high pressure sand at jeans. In Turkey the practice was widespread until banned in 2009 when doctors diagnosed silicosis in former textile workers. Although the danger of silicosis has been known for a long time, especially in the mining industry, Turkey was the first country where the disease was diagnosed in textile workers.
Silicosis is an incurable and often deadly disease. It’s caused by inhalation of silica dust generated during sandblasting. While working twelve hours a day and six days a week wearing only a disposable mask covering mouth and nose, workers were exposed intensively to silica dust. Many became ill very rapidly, sometimes even after a few months of labor. The disease is irreversible and progresses even when exposure to silica dust ends. Until now approximately 50 persons have died in Turkey and about 1200 have been diagnosed with silicosis. But medical experts fear that more than 5000 persons are affected.
The Turkish ban on sandblasting does not put an end to the problem. When workshops closed in Turkey, production was moved to other countries like Bangladesh, China, Pakistan and Egypt. In these countries workers are still largely unaware of the risks and are prone to misdiagnosis when they become ill. Western demand for denim that has a worn look is high and although several international labels have publicly « banned » sandblasting from their production process, the technique continues to be used by manufacturers producing for Western labels.
The photographs show thirty-one-year old Mehmet and forty-one-year old Bekir. These men sandblasted jeans in workshops in Istanbul. Now they suffer from advanced silicosis. Their only hope is a lung transplantation.

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