[CPEO-MEF] HERBICIDES: "Post-Vietnam Dioxin Exposure in Agent Orange-Contaminated C-123 Aircraft"

[Lenny Siegel <lsiegel@cpeo.org>]

Post-Vietnam Dioxin Exposure in Agent Orange-Contaminated C-123 Aircraft

Institute of Medicine
May, 2015


From 1972 to 1982, approximately 1,500-2,100 US Air Force Reserve  
personnel trained and worked on C-123 aircraft that had formerly been  
used to spray herbicides in Vietnam as part of Operation Ranch Hand.  
After becoming aware that some of the aircraft on which they had  
worked had previously served this purpose, some of these AF  
Reservists applied to the US Department of Veterans Affairs (VA) for  
compensatory coverage under the Agent Orange Act of 1991. The Act  
provides health care and disability coverage for health conditions  
that have been deemed presumptively service-related for herbicide  
exposure during the Vietnam War. The VA denied the applications on  
the basis that these veterans were ineligible because as non-Vietnam- 
era veterans or as Vietnam-era veterans without "boots on the ground"  
service in Vietnam, they were not covered. However, with the  
knowledge that some air and wipe samples taken between 1979 and 2009  
from some of the C-123s used in Operation Ranch Hand showed the  
presence of agent orange residues, representatives of the C-123  
Veterans Association began a concerted effort to reverse VA's  
position and obtain coverage.

At the request of the VA, Post-Vietnam Dioxin Exposure in Agent  
Orange-Contaminated C-123 Aircraft evaluates whether or not service  
in these C-123s could have plausibly resulted in exposures  
detrimental to the health of these Air Force Reservists. The  
Institute of Medicine assembled an expert committee to address this  
question qualitatively, but in a scientific and evidence-based  
fashion. This report evaluates the reliability of the available  
information for establishing exposure and addresses and places in  
context whether any documented residues represent potentially harmful  
exposure by characterizing the amounts available and the degree to  
which absorption might be expected. Post-Vietnam Dioxin Exposure  
rejects the idea that the dioxin residues detected on interior  
surfaces of the C-123s were immobile and effectively inaccessible to  
the Reservists as a source of exposure. Accordingly, this report  
states with confidence that the Air Force Reservists were exposed  
when working in the Operation Ranch Hand C-123s and so experienced  
some increase in their risk of a variety of adverse responses.

For more information and to download the report, go to
http://www.nap.edu/catalog/18848/post-vietnam-dioxin-exposure-in- 
agent-orange-contaminated-c-123-aircraft


--

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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