Predictors for dioxin accumulation in residents living in Da Nang and Bien Hoa, Vietnam, many years after Agent Orange use

Highlights

• Blood dioxin levels were measured from residents in Bien Hoa and Da Nang, Vietnam.

• Blood dioxin levels were related to individual and environmental risk factors.

• Fish farming was associated with higher blood dioxin levels at both locations.

• Blood dioxin levels were positively correlated with living on flooded property.

• Da Nang dioxin sites are being cleaned up so exposure should decrease.

Abstract

Agent Orange (AO) was the main defoliant used by the US in Vietnam from 1961 to 1971; AO was contaminated with dioxin (2,3,7,8-tetrachlorodibenzo-p-dioxin, or TCDD). Three major dioxin “hot spots” remain from previous AO storage and use at former US bases at Bien Hoa, Da Nang, and Phu Cat, posing potential health risks for Vietnamese living on or near these hot spots. We evaluated potential risk factors contributing to serum TCDD levels in Vietnamese residents at and near contaminated sites in Da Nang and Bien Hoa, Vietnam. We used multiple linear regression to analyze possible associations of blood dioxin concentrations with demographic, socioeconomic, lifestyle, and dietary risk factors for residents living on or near these hot spots. For the Da Nang study, fish farming on the site, living on property flooded from monsoon rains, and age were among the factors showing significant positive associations with serum TCDD concentrations. For the Bien Hoa study, fish farmers working at this site and their immediate family members had significantly higher serum TCDD concentrations. Our results suggest that water-related activities, especially fish-farming, at the hot spots increased the risk of exposure to dioxin.

Agent Orange Zone: http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0045653514011400

Agent Orange Vietnam News

Vietnamese forest devastated by Agent Orange restored to health

The Vietnamese government launched a large-scale reforestation effort after the war to restore the area to its natural state. Red mangrove (rhizophora apiculata) saplings were brought into the area by boats.

"With no maps or compasses, we lived on a boat every day"” recalled Vien Ngoc Nam, a professor of forestry at Nong Lam University.

Thirty-five years after the start of the rehabilitation program, the forest is now home to at least 16 mammal and 135 bird species.

AO victims will file fourth lawsuit on manufacturers

Vietnamese victims of Agent Orange will proceed with their fourth lawsuit against American chemical companies that produced the toxic defoliant sprayed by US forces during the American War.

Major General Tran Ngoc Tho, head of the Association for Victims of Agent Orange in HCM City, made the announcement last Saturday at a ceremony marking the 52nd anniversary of the day (August 10, 1961) US troops began to spray large parts of Viet Nam with Agent Orange.

Speaking at the ceremony that was telecast live, Tho told the audience of AO victims and officials that the three earlier lawsuits had been rejected with the explanation that there was not enough evidence.


4 decades after war ended, Agent Orange still ravaging Vietnamese

Le and her daughter are second- and third-generation victims of dioxin exposure, the result of the U.S. military’s use of Agent Orange during the Vietnam War, when the U.S. Air Force sprayed more than 20 million gallons of Agent Orange and other herbicides over parts of southern Vietnam and along the borders of neighboring Laos and Cambodia. The herbicides were contaminated with dioxin, a deadly compound that remains toxic for decades and causes birth defects, cancer and other illnesses.

To this day, dioxin continues to poison the land and the people. The United States has never accepted responsibility for these victims – it denies that Agent Orange is responsible for diseases among Vietnamese that are accepted as Agent Orange-caused among American veterans – and it’s unclear when this chain of misery will end.

Read more here: http://www.miamiherald.com/2013/07/22/3514489/4-decades-after-war-ended-agent.html#storylink=cpy

Horrors of Agent Orange linger in Vietnam

"The children at the Peace Village have many different problems caused by Agent Orange," says Tu Du Hospital rehabilitation department chief, Dr Nguyen Thi Phuong Tan.

"Some are deaf or blind; others are missing limbs."

Abnormal head swelling due to a condition called hydrocephalus is also common, as are skin problems like Minh Anh's, and reduced mental capacity.

But in each case, the cause is from the same thing – inherited genetic malformations because their parents, grandparents or even great grandparents were exposed to Agent Orange during the Vietnam War.