[CPEO-MEF] HERBICIDES, HEALTH: "Agent Orange-Contaminated Planes Could Have Sickened Vets After The War: Federal Report"

[Lenny Siegel <lsiegel@cpeo.org>]

Agent Orange-Contaminated Planes Could Have Sickened Vets After The  
War: Federal Report

by Lynne Peeples
Huffington Post
January 9, 2015

Lingering amounts of the herbicide Agent Orange aboard repurposed  
airplanes after the Vietnam War could have sickened military  
veterans, according to a new federal report.

In findings released Friday, an Institute of Medicine committee  
"emphatically" refutes a recurrent argument made by the U.S. Air  
Force and Department of Veteran Affairs that any carcinogenic dioxin  
or other components of Agent Orange contaminating its fleet of C-123  
cargo planes would have been "dried residues" and therefore unlikely  
to pose any meaningful exposure risks to the 1,500 to 2,100 Air Force  
Reserve personnel who served aboard the planes between 1972 and 1982.

That contention has been the basis for the VA's denial of benefits to  
sick veterans, and remains reflected on the agency's website today.  
But in the new report, the committee states "with confidence" that  
these dried residues in fact could have posed dangers: the Air Force  
Reservists "were exposed," write the Institute of Medicine authors.


...

For the entire article, see
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2015/01/09/agent-orange-veterans- 
health_n_6445226.html

--

Lenny Siegel
Executive Director, Center for Public Environmental Oversight
a project of the Pacific Studies Center
278-A Hope St., Mountain View, CA 94041
Voice: 650/961-8918 or 650/969-1545
Fax: 650/961-8918
<lsiegel@cpeo.org>
http://www.cpeo.org

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