Michael
Jan 7th 2010, 12:56 PM
[quote]The Agent Orange Boomerang
A dark legacy of the Vietnam War is creating a whole new set of problems.
Article (http://www.washingtonmonthly.com/features/2010/1001.spc-rep.html)
There are four separate articles at the link that address the various angles of this horrific problem. There is the legacy of environmental destruction in Vietnam caused by US munitions such as Agent Orange - and the issue of US compensation for the cost of dealing with this. There is also the legacy of many thousands of US veterans of the Vietnam War that suffer from Agent Orange related medical problems and are denied VA medical care.
Overall, just an ugly but important topic. Wars often have ugly consequences many decades afterwards.
One issue that strikes me as particularly poignant here is the way that mysterious chemical compounds can get 'approval' for usage based on very slim studies of effects (very low bar for approval) but then have an extrodinary regulatory 'high bar' for determining culpability for human illnesses that result. Methinks we have this backwards.
A dark legacy of the Vietnam War is creating a whole new set of problems.
Article (http://www.washingtonmonthly.com/features/2010/1001.spc-rep.html)
There are four separate articles at the link that address the various angles of this horrific problem. There is the legacy of environmental destruction in Vietnam caused by US munitions such as Agent Orange - and the issue of US compensation for the cost of dealing with this. There is also the legacy of many thousands of US veterans of the Vietnam War that suffer from Agent Orange related medical problems and are denied VA medical care.
Overall, just an ugly but important topic. Wars often have ugly consequences many decades afterwards.
One issue that strikes me as particularly poignant here is the way that mysterious chemical compounds can get 'approval' for usage based on very slim studies of effects (very low bar for approval) but then have an extrodinary regulatory 'high bar' for determining culpability for human illnesses that result. Methinks we have this backwards.