Agent Orange, the Vietnam War, and lasting health effects.

Agent Orange is at the core of an ongoing controversy involving veterans organizations that want the Federal govenment to complete a study intended to examine possible lasting health effects of exposure to this herbicide during the Vietnam War. Many Vietnam veterans are quite concerned that various health problems they have suffered may be associated with exposure to Agent Orange in Vietnam. The problem now is to get the government , or possibly some university or private contractor, to complete a well-conducted study on this subject. Various phenoxy herbicides were used in Vietnam from about 1962 to 1971, principally as defoliants to kill plant life and remove leaves from trees so as to allow observation ofenemy movement from the air. Agent Orange, a mixture of equal parts of the two active ingredients 2,4-dichlorophenoxyacetic acid and 2,4,5-trichlorophenoxyacetic acid, was the most commonly used her-bicide (1). The name "Agent Orange" comes from the orange stripes on the 55-gallon drums the herbicide was stored in. Unfortunately, because of contamination of the 2,4,5-tri-chlorophenoxyacetic acid part and possibly the 2,4-dichloro-phenoxyacetic acid part, the Agent Orange herbicide used in Vietnam contained levels, estimated at less than I to more than 20 parts per million, of an impurity known commonly as "dioxins" (1). The concern of many veterans is that exposure to Agent Orange, and especially the dioxin contaminant, may be associated with various chronic health problems. At present, however, lasting adverse health effects in humans possibly associated with exposure to dioxin-contaminated Agent Orange are not completely understood. Concern about ill-health effects arising form Agent Orange exposure prompted Congress to order an investigation of possible long-term effects of military service in Vietnam, especially effects that might be linked to Agent Orange exposure. This Congressional action set in motion a series of scientific or epidemiological studies. The Centers for Disease Control, back in 1982, was given responsibility for doing some of the scientific work. After spending tens of millions of dollars over a period of several years, however, the Centers for Disease Control basically abandoned the work in an uncompleted state, claiming in essence that existing Agent Orange spraying records and other available material did not allow accurate determination ofdioxin exposure of individual service personnel (2). The decision ofthe Centers for Disease Control to pull out of the study ofthe effects ofAgent Orange has a questionable legal basis because ofthe impetus for the work comes from a 1979 law …