Team Maps the Human Epigenome

from our friend Gerald Ney...

from January/February 2016 DISCOVER pg 41:

"In the 12 years since the Human Genome Project was completed, biologists have linked more than a thousand regions of the genome to disease. 'But in most cases , we don't actually know how they function,' says Manolis Kellis, a computational biologist at Massachusetts Institute of Technology.

Enter the epigenome.  If the human genome is the book of life, the epigenome is the collection of bookmarks and highlighting that tells the cell what passages of the book to read.  These marks include chemical tags on DNA that make genes unreadable, as well as chemical tags on proteins that help expose DNA inside the the cell nuclei, making genes readable.  They're the reasobn that cells from the liver, heart or brain differ profoundly.  The National Institutes of Health Roadmap Epigenetic Consortium, including Kellis, published the most comprehensive map of the human epigenome this February.

Kellis led the data analysis team, which applied machine-learning algorithms to decode the language of the epigenome.  The map serves up important clues about how a single fertilized egg can develop into the diversity of tissues in the human body - and how healthy tissue can become diseased.  For example, one team in the consortium reported how metastatic cancer cells contain an epigenetic fingerprint that reveals the tissue they came from, which could lead to better targeted cancer treatments.  Another team reported spotting DNA sequences that may trigger autoimmune diseases."

Cracking Mutations' Disease Code

"Thousands of mutations are linked to disease, yet only a few cause illness by directly disrupting proteins, the cell's workhorses.  Scientists have figured out how several of the other mutations spur disease.

Using thousands of tissue samples from cadavers, researchers on the Genotype-Tissue Expression project (GTEx) isolated and sequenced DNA and a variety of protein encoding RNAs from each sample.

Many disease linked mutations, it turned out lie in stretches of DNA that don't encode proteins themselves but instead regulate genes elsewhere in the genome that then go on to disrupt tissue function.

Genomic makeup also can affect to what extent genes are turned on or off in a person's tissues, thereby causing disease, , says Kristin Ardle, a Broad Institute biologist who co-led the analysis published in May."

Danger in the drink: Stricken vets fight VA over Camp Lejeune water poisoning

http://www.foxnews.com/us/2015/12/10/camp-lejeune-veterans-press-va-for-information-on-toxic-water-disability-claims/

Joseph "Danny" Zambito was 18 when he trained as a Marine in 1964 at Camp Lejeune, where he -- like one million others at the base -- was exposed to cancer-causing chemicals in one of the worst water contamination cases in U.S. history, spanning more than three decades.

Zambito, now 70, lost both kidneys and his bladder to cancer, but the Florida man said he hasn't received a single disability benefit from the Department of Veterans Affairs -- whose anonymous panel of "subject matter experts" renders medical opinions on veterans' claims their diseases were caused by toxic drinking water at the North Carolina military training base.

"It makes me feel very angry," said Zambito, who undergoes dialysis four times a week at a center in Zephyrhills. "They're dragging their feet on this and giving me the runaround."

"You just want to give up," added his wife, Judy. "How can you fight the government?"

On Monday, the Veterans Legal Services Clinic at Yale Law School filed an extensive Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) request on behalf of three veterans groups seeking records from the VA about its program for investigating claims. Since the program's launch three years ago, the rate of Camp Lejeune toxic water disability claims being approved has dropped from approximately 25 percent to 8 percent, according to VA statistics. Advocates for veterans want to know who the purported experts passing judgment on the claims are, and how they arrive at their conclusions.

"There's been an enormous lack of transparency and it takes various forms," Rory Minnis, 33, a former Marine and second-year Yale law student, told FoxNews.com Thursday. "We want to know what qualifies them to give opinions on these extremely complicated cases. We want to know what the methodology is that they have in place."

Minnis and others fear the process is aimed more at limiting claims than giving sickened Marines their due, and perhaps more ominously, could be a blueprint for the military's handling of similar situations in the future.

"This extends far beyond the issue of Camp Lejeune," said Minnis, who served in Iraq and Afghanistan. "The VA has referred to it [the program] in close door meetings as the model for the future for toxic exposure claims facing veterans."

Between 1953 and 1987, nearly 1 million veterans, their families and civilian employees at Camp Lejeune were exposed to drinking and bathing water contaminated with dry cleaning chemicals, degreasers and a host of other toxins. Many base residents developed illnesses -- including rare cancers -- and disabilities in the aftermath.

According to the Agency for Toxic Substances and Disease Registry, "past exposures from the 1950s through February 1985 to trichloroethylene (TCE), tetrachloroethylene (PCE), vinyl chloride, and other contaminants in the drinking water at the Camp Lejeune likely increased the risk of cancers (kidney, multiple myeloma, leukemias, and others), adverse birth outcomes, and other adverse health effects of residents (including infants and children), civilian workers, Marines and Naval personnel at Camp Lejeune."

Victims claim the U.S. Marine Corps hid knowledge of the problem for years and did not warn people their health might be at risk.

Retired Master Sgt. Jerry Ensminger, founder of The Few, The Proud, The Forgotten -- one of the groups seeking information -- lived on the base with his family in 1975. Ensminger's young daughter, Janey, was diagnosed with leukemia at age 6 and died when she was 9. After learning about the water contamination in a local news report years after Janey's death, Ensminger said he made it his mission to press the government for accountability.

Zambito, now 70, was exposed to the contaminated water at Camp Lejeune. The former Marine later lost both kidneys and his bladder to cancer.

"We have denial decisions with the write-ups from these subject matter experts with citations directly taken from Wikipedia," Ensminger told FoxNews.com. "These so-called experts are going back and questioning the judgment of the veteran's own physician, without ever seeing the patient or their medical records."

"This program was not developed to assist veterans. This program was developed to deny veterans their benefits," said Ensminger, 63, of White Lake, N.C. "This cannot stand. It's an atrocity."

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Risk of death nearly doubled for Vietnam veterans with PTSD

http://www.businessinsider.com/r-risk-of-death-nearly-doubled-for-vietnam-veterans-with-ptsd-2015-12

(Reuters Health) - Higher than average death rates among Vietnam War veterans with post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD) suggest that combat trauma may still be affecting veterans' health even decades after the war, according to a new study.

U.S. veterans of the Vietnam War followed from the 1980s to 2011 were almost twice as likely to die during that period if they had PTSD compared to those without the disorder.

The findings can inform healthcare for Vietnam veterans, now mostly in their 60s and older, and prevention efforts for the next generation of soldiers, the study team writes in the American Journal of Epidemiology.

"The study offers really valuable empirical information that can help us better understand how to care for our Vietnam veterans . . . and also more recent veterans," said study author Nida Corry, of Abt Associates in Durham, North Carolina.

PTSD can develop after a person has been through a traumatic event like combat, child abuse or sexual abuse, terrorism attacks and other disasters, according to the Department of Veterans Affairs. Symptoms can include flashbacks, avoiding reminders of the traumatic events, changes in beliefs and activities and being overly alert, according to the VA.

A study published earlier this year estimated that more than 1 in 10 Vietnam war zone veterans still have PTSD or some symptoms of the disorder (see Reuters Health story of July 22, 2015, here: http://reut.rs/1NsyrVe).

Previous studies have also suggested that Vietnam vets - especially those who served in the war zone - are at increased risk of death, and that the added risk may be related to PTSD. However, those studies were often limited, according to the authors of the current study.

For the current study, the researchers from Abt Associates, New York University in New York City and other organizations analyzed information collected from 1987 to 2011 on nearly 2,400 Vietnam veterans, including 1,632 who served in the combat theater, which included Vietnam, Laos and Cambodia.

Overall, about 9 percent of theater vets had PTSD at the time of the initial interviews in the 1980s, which was significantly higher than the 1 percent rate in vets who served outside the war zone.

About 16 percent of all Vietnam veterans who were alive in the 1980s are now dead, with most deaths due to cancer and heart disease, the authors estimate.

Male Vietnam War theater veterans who had PTSD were about 87 percent more likely to die between 1987 and 2011 than those without the condition - even after adjusting for demographic, social and economic factors.

"What we found is that having PTSD was associated with a greater risk of death from cancer and external causes," Corry said, such as traffic accidents, suicide, murder and other accidental injuries.

Male and female veterans who were exposed to high levels of stress in the war zone - but not necessarily diagnosed with PTSD - were also at increased risk of death during the study period, the researchers found.

The combination was even deadlier. Veterans with high levels of war zone stress exposure who developed PTSD were at the greatest risk of death, Corry said.

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Veterans express frustration to VA over Camp Lejeune benefits

http://www.tampabay.com/news/military/veterans/veterans-express-frustration-to-va-over-camp-lejeune-benefits/2256666

TAMPA — Robert Shuster of Hudson stood up Saturday at a public meeting with the Department of Veterans Affairs and federal scientists studying the health effects of polluted drinking at Camp Lejeune, N.C.

He held up two pieces of paper. One was the surgical pathology report Shuster sent to the VA that diagnosed him with sarcoma. The other document was a letter from the VA denying his claim for benefits, saying in stilted language the disease did not exist in him — he didn't have a malignancy.

"How can it not exist?" Shuster, 54, asked plaintively.

About 150 Marine Corps veterans and family members crowded a room at the Grand Hyatt Tampa Bay for a town hall meeting to hear VA officials and federal scientists provide an update on work studying contamination at the North Carolina base.

The VA representatives heard great frustration from veterans about their difficulties in getting the agency to provide benefits for those who were sickened by the water.

Up to a million veterans were exposed to what scientists consider one of the nation's worst episodes of water contamination. Drinking water at the base was tainted with a stew of industrial solvents and components of gasoline for at least 30 years ending in the 1980s.

Tens of thousands of those veterans and their family members now live in Florida, the state with the second-highest number of potential victims behind North Carolina, federal figures show.

The meeting included epidemiologists at the Agency for Toxic Substances and Disease Registry, the lead agency studying health effects. The agency has concluded through a number of studies that contaminated water created a variety of health effects, from birth defects to some types of cancer.

But for veterans who came to the meeting, most of their concern was directed at the VA.

"You're not helping us, you're hurting us," said Camp Lejeune veteran Paul Maslow, 64, of Daytona Beach, who said he has inoperable tumors on his spine and elsewhere in his body. "The more you delay, the more of us who are going to die. And we thank you very much for that."

Some expressed pointed anger at the VA "subject-matter experts" who often weigh in on claims, they said, without seeming to pay particular attention to the evidence veterans submit to get benefits.

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Documentary about Vietnam Agent Orange victim shortlisted for Oscar

http://www.thanhniennews.com/arts-culture/documentary-about-vietnam-agent-orange-victim-shortlisted-for-oscar-55787.html

An American short documentary about a Vietnamese boy with disabilities caused by Agent Orange has been shortlisted for an Oscar. 

"Chau, Beyond the Lines" will compete with nine other entries in the Documentary Short Subject category of the 88th Academy Awards. The final five nominations will be announced on January 14. 

The documentary shows the effects of Agent Orange, a chemical sprayed over the Vietnam jungles during the Vietnam War by the US to deprive the Vietnamese soldiers of their food and cover.

After 20 years of war, Chau, a teenager living in a peace camp, is disabled by the effect of chemicals. With a rare disability in his arms and legs, he battles with the reality of his dream to one day become a professional clothing designer.

The 33-minute documentary, directed by Courtney Marsh and produced by Jerry Franck and Marsh, has its filming extended over eight years.

“We have over 100 signed letters addressed to Congress encouraging the cleanup of Agent Orange in Vietnam. Thanks to everyone. It truly makes a difference,” said director Courtney Marsh on her Facebook timeline last week.

The film’s latest award was the Best Documentary Short Film at the Fort Lauderdale International Film Festival in November.

The 88th Academy Awards ceremony, presented by the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences (AMPAS), will take place on February 28, 2016, at the Dolby Theater in Hollywood, California.

New Jersey’s poorest live surrounded by contamination

http://www.newsworks.org/index.php/local/new-jersey/88952-dirty-little-secrets-new-jerseys-poorest-live-surrounded-by-contamination

Agent Orange, the chemical used to clear the jungle during the Vietnam War, was made in New Jersey. It’s now at the bottom of the Passaic River and buried under Newark, entombed in cement.

For 150 years, New Jersey manufactured chemicals and products that became familiar fixtures in homes: charcoal and lighter fluid, plastic, guns and silk. It’s the job of the state’s Department of Environmental Protection to ensure that New Jersey’s industrial past isn’t affecting the health of residents today.

But an investigation by WNYC finds most of the state’s poorest residents are living near a contaminated site with no plan in place to clean it up. And it’s not entirely clear whether anybody even knows with certainty what the risks are.

WNYC’s Findings

According to an analysis by WNYC’s Data News Team, 89 percent of New Jerseyans live within a mile of a contaminated site. Most of those sites are in the process of being cleaned up, which can take years.

But our investigation found 1,464 of the state’s 14,066 known contaminated sites don’t have any clean-up plan in place. Many sites have sat orphaned and polluted for years, and they are disproportionately found in low-income communities.

• 74 percent of residents who live below the poverty line in New Jersey are living within a mile of a contaminated site with no plan in place to clean up the contamination, compared to half of residents who are not below the poverty line.

• 79 percent of the state’s Hispanic population and 75 percent of the state’s black population lives within a mile of a site with no clean-up plan, compared to 42 percent of white residents.

Months ago, the state Department of Environmental Protection, the DEP, told WNYC that the sites with no clean-up plan were mostly abandoned properties like old gas stations and former dry cleaners where the state couldn’t find the owners.

But WNYC went through the list and knocked on doors, and we found open, functioning businesses and institutions — including a state prison, hospitals, police and fire stations, churches, and schools — all of which have no plan in place to clean up contamination.

“This is exactly what we said was going to happen,” said advocate Ana Baptista. She grew up next door to a steel drum factory in Newark’s Ironbound neighborhood and now is an environmental policy professor at The New School. “Years ago people were screaming at the state that there were these loopholes.”

The state is no longer responsible for overseeing most of New Jersey's contaminated sites.

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EPA reverses decision on crop dusting spray

http://www.dailystatesman.com/story/2257412.html

WAPPAPELLO, Mo. -- The Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) is backpedaling its approval of a herbicide containing the same chemicals that allegedly sickened three people in the spring of 2015 near Wappapello, Mo.

According to the Associated Press, the EPA announced in a court filing Nov. 25 that it had received new information from manufacturer Dow AgroSciences that a weed killer called Enlist Duo is probably more toxic to other plants than previously thought.

In a filing with the 9th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals, the EPA said it "might not have issued the existing registration had it been aware" of the new information when it originally approved the product a year ago to be used with new strains of genetically modified corn and soybeans, the AP reported.

Enlist Duo is a combination of the glyphosate, the main active ingredient in the herbicide Roundup, and 2, 4-D another herbicide that was one of the chemicals, although not the main and most toxic chemical, used in Agent Orange.

Agent Orange was a defoliant used during the Vietnam war and linked to a number of illnesses.

Coincidentally, the EPA decision comes just weeks after the Missouri Department of Agriculture (MDA) handed down civil actions for pesticide drift against two Southeast Missouri agricultural chemical applicators.

While the EPA decision is not related to the incidents near Wappapello, Enlist Duo is composed of the same chemicals three people believe made them ill following aerial applications that were later found to have violated Missouri pesticide regulations.

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Monsanto Goes To Trial For Crime Against Nature And Environment; ‘Most Serious Threat Humans Ever Faced?’

http://www.ischoolguide.com/articles/37624/20151207/monsanto-crime-against-humanity.htm

Biotech company Monsanto will face international tribunal over crimes against nature and humanity, and ecocide.

"The Tribunal will rely on the 'Guiding Principles on Business and Human Rights' adopted at the UN in 2011. It will also assess potential criminal liability on the basis of the Rome Statue that created the International Criminal Court in The Hague in 2002, and it will consider whether a reform of international criminal law is warranted to include crimes against the environment or ecocide, as a prosecutable criminal offense, so that natural persons could incur criminal liability," the Monsanto Tribunal, an international group of professionals, said in a statement.

(OCA), IFOAM International Organics, Navdanya, Regeneration International (RI), and Millions Against Monsanto according to a report by Disinformation.

"The time is long overdue for a global citizens' tribunal to put Monsanto on trial for crimes against humanity and the environment. We are in Paris this month to address the most serious threat that humans have ever faced in our 100-200,000 year evolution-global warming and climate disruption," Ronnie Cummins, president of the Organic Consumers Association, said.

Monsanto's trial for crimes against humanity and nature is scheduled to take place in The Hague, Netherlands from Oct 12 to 6 of next year.

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NT$168 mil. payout for dioxin victims

http://www.chinapost.com.tw/taiwan/national/national-news/2015/12/08/452940/NT$168-mil.htm

TAIPEI, Taiwan -- China Petrochemical Development Corp. (CPDC, 中石化), previously a state-owned enterprise, and the Ministry of Economic Affairs (MOEA, 經濟部) must compensate 304 affected residents in proximity to the firm's former chemical factory with a payout totaling NT$168.17 million, the Tainan District Court ruled on Monday.

The legal battle has spanned nearly seven years, and the sum of government compensation is the largest in Taiwan's history, according to local media.
Residents said they would deliberate on whether to continue the trial against CPDC, since the amount is far from the NT$340 million they initially demanded.
According to prosecutors, the former power plant in Tainan caused mercury pollution to the surrounding environment and emitted carcinogenic dioxin. In 2003, researchers found that fish and shrimp in nearby bodies of water contained mercury and dioxin levels that exceeded safety levels.
Residents near the former chemical plant filed a lawsuit against the corporation for allegedly causing the dioxin contamination in 2008.

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Remember

MARK YOUR CALENDAR! CALL IN DAY

WEDNESDAY DECEMBER 9

Call 202-224-3121, give the operator your state and ZIP Code and you will be connected with your elected representatives office. Ask to speak with the Legislative Aide for Veterans Affairs.

Be clear that you are calling as a constituent, asking for their support of H.R. 1769 and S. 901, the Toxic Exposure Research Act of 2015.

Do it for your children, and their children. 

Time is running out.

WHAT ARE THEY WAITING FOR?

Monsanto CEO on debate over GMO and food labeling

http://www.cbsnews.com/videos/monsanto-ceo-on-debate-over-gmo-and-food-labeling/

Genetically modified organisms have been part of our diet for years. The Grocery Manufacturers Association says up to 80 percent of processed food sold in the U.S. is genetically modified and mostly unlabeled. Monsanto, one of the world’s largest producers of genetically modified seeds, is committed to innovation in agriculture, but critics say it should be more transparent. Monsanto CEO Hugh Grant joins “CBS This Morning” to address the ongoing debate over GMOs and questions surrounding their herbicide, Roundup.

 

Monsanto CEO Hugh Grant on CBS This Morning

Unfortunately  you will have to suffer through a 30 second commercial for Estee Lauder before the video begins. Use that time to take some deep breaths before listening to Monsanto's CEO Hugh Grant defend his company.