2013 was a record year for educating the public and veterans about
Agent Orange, the other rainbow agents, burn pits, and depleted uranium
use by the government both domestically and overseas.
More than twenty-one town hall meetings have been held, with
attendance ranging from one hundred to almost five hundred people. At
each meeting Agent Orange folders are distributed that contain
information on how to run a town hall meeting, copies of individual
stories (The Faces of Agent Orange), a copy of the Agent Orange
Self-Help Guide, a report from our Communications Department, a report
on the impact of Agent Orange on U.S. veterans after forty years, the
Agent Orange/Dioxin Committee position paper on birth defects, a report
on male mediated studies, a list of all ships recognized as exposed to
Agent Orange, an information paper from the Department of Defense on
herbicide tests and storage outside of Vietnam, and a report on proposed
legislation for veterans'families for research and treatment.
The committee continues to work with the National Birth Defect
Registry and has adopted two resolutions. The first deals with the C-123
Pilots and Aircrew Association and the second with the Blue Water Navy
Association. We continue to advocate for Vietnam veterans who were
exposed to Agent Orange in locations other than Vietnam—Thailand, Laos,
Okinawa, the Philippines, Johnston Island, Korea, Cambodia, Guam, and
many military installations within the United States. We have reached
outside of the VVA and AVVA membership and have held town hall meetings
in conjunction with other organizations. All have been very successful,
and we have noticed an increase in local membership once a town hall
meeting is completed.
Scheduling town hall meetings for 2014 has begun. May and much of
June already are booked. States that have scheduled meetings so far this
year: Florida, New Jersey, Oregon, Washington, Tennessee, North
Carolina, Michigan, Nevada, Alabama, and Maine.
We are endorsing Sen. Richard Blumenthal's (D-Conn.) legislation,
S.1602, which calls for all veterans exposed to toxic substances to be
diagnosed and treated, along with their progeny. We will host a meeting
on the Hill on April 10 with as many members of Congress as possible to
introduce and urge passage of S.1602. Attending this briefing will be
VVA Board members, state council presidents, AVVA members, and children
of veterans who have been exposed to Agent Orange.
In 2013 we printed some thirty thousand self-help guides and
distributed them nationwide for free. This year it is estimated that we
will need forty-five thousand booklets due to the high demand from
veterans and their families. Our Agent Orange webpage—along with our
Facebook page, Twitter feed, and other social media—has grown greatly.
We continue to fight for new conditions to be listed on the presumptive
list recognizing the harm caused by our exposure to Agent Orange and the
other rainbow agents. Recently the Institute of Medicine reported that
there has been no difference in the reaction since 2010 for Agent
Orange-related strokes. We will be pushing for this condition to be
listed as a presumptive, along with skin cancer.
SOURCE>>>
http://www.vva.org/Committees/AgentOrange/
