Agent Orange Exposure, Vietnam War Veterans and the Risk of Prostate Cancer
According to the US Census Bureau there are over 8 million Vietnam Era Veterans. Many have now reached the 6th decade. Some 20 million gallons of Agent Orange was released into the jungle of South Vietnam.
This herbicidal agent, used by the U.S. military in an effort to deny its opponent the thick jungle cover that they enjoyed, is a mixture of two phenoxy herbicides. During the production of one of the two main components, 2,3,7,8-tetrachlorodibenzodioxin (TTCD), a dioxin, is formed. Proposed carcinogenic properties of Agent Orange are attributed to this TTCD dioxin byproduct.
Thousands of veterans are known to have been exposed to Agent Orange.
Previous studies have examined the relationship of Agent Orange with incidence of prostate cancer. Some believe that studies reported to date have been too small, examined patients that were too young, or were conducted in the pre-PSA era. Chamie and colleagues re-examined the issue in this noteworthy study.
Clinical data from 17,000 Vietnam War era veterans who received care in the Northern California VA system were included in the analysis. 6,214 were exposed to Agent Orange, while 6,930 patients had no do ented exposure.
Exposed veterans were more likely to develop prostate cancer (239 vs 124 men).
Moreover, exposed patients presented at a younger age (59.7 vs 62.2 years), were found to have higher grade disease (2-fold increase in Gleason 8-10), and were more likely to present with metastases (13.4% vs 4.0%).
This study’s importance cannot be overstated. If these findings are substantiated, patients with history of Agent Orange exposure should be screened earlier for prostate cancer.
Furthermore, these results may affect Service Connection policies of VA Medical Centers.
http://www.urotoday.com/99999999/bro...te_cancer.html
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... to say nothing of the injuries and diseases that AO caused to Viet Namese.
http://www.organicconsumers.org/mons...ange032102.cfm
Good ol' Monsanto, one of the most reliably evil corps ever.
Monsanto is currently inserting itself into the US food supply by buying exclusive rights to seeds and forcing farmers, worldwide, to buy every year from Monsanto rather than harvesting their own crops seeds for free, enforced by an army of aggressive PIs.
Can we count on WC, Yon, Clanny to defend Monsanto?
"Go ahead, punks, make my day."
yeah, yeah, it's only "associated with", not causality. There could be something else among the AO-exposed vets causing early, adanced prostate cancer. Certainly, that how DoD will counter-argue and how SCOTUS will rule.
Ins utions trump individuals in the fascist, totalitarian USA.
In another 10-20 years they will be doing similar studies on Gulf-War syndrome, I'm sure.
I have had some first-hand converstations with guys that have had that, and been told to essentially shut the up about it if they wanted any disability at all.
One guy has some very wicked symptoms, and was quite unable to work, so he just sucked it up, and keeps VERY quiet about it.
I normally don't buy into government conspiracies, but this stinks of a burocratic coverup.
For those who don't know about the syndrome, the best guess I have seen is that it is the result of "deep brain" injury caused by taking nerve agent pills.
The army forced soldiers to take tablet forms of nerve agents during the first gulf war, on the theory that it would help build up some form of immunity to nerve agents, should Saddam have attempted to use them.
The thinking is that the dissolved nerve agent, carried in the blood, went to the deepest parts of the brain that control some very basic functions like sleep/wake cycles and others, and killed off just a little bit of the brain there.
The government has sworn up and down that the thousands of soldiers who came back with wierd hosts of symptoms are making it up.
Not surprised at this kind of stuff when we are fighting enemies who use chemical and biological weapons. It's expected to be honest.
there was a recent article down under, that they were performing tests in australia in the outback, not just any outback, but n next to a water dam river.....
ps. wtf drop in the south when you can drop it in the north where the enemy is....
Except that there is a good argument that the pills they were taking to supposedly help them, and not any environmental exposure is to blame.
The potential for lawsuits in the hundreds of billions of dollars is more than enough motive for the DOD to do everything they can to deny culpability. This makes me HIGHLY skeptical of their claims and studies.
Given the dearth of solid, objective clinical evidence either way, it is hard to say with any real certainty exactly what is happening, though.
I think we owe it to my fellow vets to really get to the bottom of it though.
(note: I did not go to the gulf, and was assigned stateside during the first gulf war. Intel analysts have the benefit of satellite technology and working remotely.)
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