Agent Orange & Dioxin Committee Update July/August 2022

BY SANDIE WILSON, CHAIR

The committee has been working hard to improve the situation for veteran families with toxic exposure. The committee has a mix of interested and exposed veterans hoping for relief from these problems, and looking for relief for families. We have attorneys who work on expanding that relief.

At the last committee meeting, which was virtual and in-person, we decided to ask the VVA Board of Directors to file legal action against the VA Secretary for failing to implement the Veterans Child Toxic Research law. This law not only includes the offspring of Vietnam War veterans, but also the children of any American veteran. The Board agreed to the request.

The science has improved since the Ranch Hand study was conducted by the Air Force more than 40 years ago. Specimens from that study are currently being kept by the Air Force, and at the request of VVA a task force is reexamining the data. The task force is made up of members from the VA, the Air Force, the National Academy of Sciences, and VVA — scientists, administrators, and VVA people who have been involved with studying toxic exposure for many years. The task force continues to meet on a regular basis. Linda Birnbaum, our the committee’s Leadership Conference committee seminar leader, has been chosen to lead the research subgroup.

Universities today have an interest in epigenetics and researching birth defects. These researchers are dissatisfied with the numbers of people on the current birth defects registry and the information contained about many of them. Therefore, we are requesting that anyone who knows people with birth defects encourages them to register with Birth Defects Research Center, Inc. There is no financial cost to register; the only cost is the time of the parent or other person dealing with the structural or functional problem. The last researcher requested 10,000 sets of data on a particular defect, yet BDRC only had 3,000 data sets available.

The incidents of birth defects are not limited to the children of veterans. Birth defects can occur in any birth. Now is the time to give researchers the information they need for that research. BDRC registers anyone with a birth defect, so our grass roots effort needs to get every family with a birth defect on the BDRC registry. The data form is available at Birth Defects.org

On the bright side, we have been putting a cog in OMB’s mission of waiting for the Army to die. The after-action report of the Vietnam War has to include lessons learned about toxic exposure from a rainbow of chemicals. These are the forever chemicals with detrimental effects that can be transmitted to families. For recent wars the after-action reports have to include mistakes repeated with toxic exposure from at least 28 substances.

For the remainder of our lifetimes, I believe our mission should be to put pressure on our nation’s leaders and researchers to come up with answers and effective policies to end the pain their actions forced upon military and veterans’ families. I believe together we can achieve our goal.