GAO to probe Agent Orange on Guam

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Representatives from the Government Accountability Office will be on island next week to talk to stakeholders regarding the reported incidents of Agent Orange exposure on Guam.

U.S. Navy Capt. Jeffrey Grimes, the chief of staff for Joint Region Marianas, confirmed the series of meetings during the 24th General Assembly of the Association of Mariana Islands Mayors, Vice Mayors, and Elected Municipal Council Members yesterday at the Guam Reef Hotel.

During the assembly, Santa Rita Mayor Dale Alvarez asked if the herbicide was ever used on island. Grimes acknowledged that there have been plenty of studies and discussions on the issue.

Grimes said he received a phone call yesterday confirming the GAO team's visit.

"They will be here next week to further look on the discussions that are ongoing from the veterans and other people who have worked at Andersen (Air Force Base)," he said. "They will be interacting with the military. They will be interacting with the people, the government, and the Legislature."

Agent Orange was one of the defoliants – known as "rainbow herbicides" – used by the U.S. military as part of its herbicidal warfare program during the Vietnam War from 1961 to 1971. They were used to destroy bushes, trees and vegetation to deprive insurgents of cover and food crops, as part of a starvation campaign in the early 1950s, according to Post news files.

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S. 1990, the Dependency and Indemnity Compensation Improvement Act of 2017

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On October 19, 2017, Senator Jon Tester, Ranking Member of the Senate Committee on Veterans' Affairs, introduced S. 1990, the Dependency and Indemnity Compensation Improvement Act of 2017.
This bill would increase dependency and indemnity compensation (DIC) for surviving dependents and would lower the threshold of eligibility to allow certain survivors to receive this benefit who currently do not meet the requirements. This measure would:

   Increases DIC so that the base rate is equal to 55 percent of the rate of compensation paid to a totally disabled veteran, making it more equitable with rates provided to federal civilian employee survivors. 

   Ease the 10-year rule for eligibility and replace it with a graduated scale of benefits that begins after 5 years and increases by percentage until reaching the full amount at the 10 year mark. If a veteran is rated as totally disabled for five years and dies as a result of a non-service-connected cause, a survivor would be entitled to 50 percent of total DIC benefits. This scale continues until the 10-year threshold and the maximum DIC amount is awarded. 

   Reduce the age allowed for a surviving spouse to remarry and maintain their benefits from 57 to 55, consistent with other Federal survivor benefit programs.

Vietnam: The Chemical War

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Just before dawn on Nov. 18, 1967, the men of the Army’s 266th Chemical Platoon

awoke to reveille and assembled in formation. The platoon was attached to the First Infantry Division, and the men were stationed at the division’s base, deep in the red-clay hills north of Saigon.

The men had a typically busy day ahead of them. Their tasks included obtaining 15 drums of Agent Orange to defoliate the base perimeter, firing mortars at an area just outside the base for an evening chemical drop, working at the bomb yard to prepare 24 drums of CS tear gas, making 48 white phosphorus fuses to detonate the drums, loading the drums onto a CH-47 cargo helicopter, and finally, that afternoon, dropping 24 drums of the gas from the helicopter’s rear hatch onto a target site. It was, by 1967, just another day in the life of the 266th Chemical Platoon, and in the American war in Vietnam — a war that was, in many respects, a chemical war.

It didn’t start that way. But as the conflict deepened, it became obvious that chemical weapons could play a critical role. In the case of the First Division, that realization came as the Viet Cong dug in north of Saigon with a network of underground bunkers and tunnels that were forbidding, dangerous spaces where conventional weapons would have limited effect. That fall, the 266th and other chemical platoons began training to use CS and other chemicals to support combat operations.

CS wasn’t the only tool in the platoon’s arsenal, and going after tunnels wasn’t its only mission. It handled anything related to chemicals, from spraying for mosquitoes to burning trash. It sprayed defoliants like Agent Orange and prepared napalm. Chemicals were everywhere, and their proliferation in the American war effort raised concerns that the United States was crossing a line in Vietnam, violating the 1925 Geneva Protocol’s prohibition against the first use of chemical weapons in war. 

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HAPPY THANKSGIVING

VA study shows parasite from Vietnam may be killing veterans

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HERALD, W.Va. (AP) — A half a century after serving in Vietnam, hundreds of veterans have a new reason to believe they may be dying from a silent bullet — test results show some men may have been infected by a slow-killing parasite while fighting in the jungles of Southeast Asia.

The Department of Veterans Affairs this spring commissioned a small pilot study to look into the link between liver flukes ingested through raw or undercooked fish and a rare bile duct cancer. It can take decades for symptoms to appear. By then, patients are often in tremendous pain, with just a few months to live.

Of the 50 blood samples submitted, more than 20 percent came back positive or bordering positive for liver fluke antibodies, said Sung-Tae Hong, the tropical medicine specialist who carried out the tests at Seoul National University in South Korea.

“It was surprising,” he said, stressing the preliminary results could include false positives and that the research is ongoing.

Northport VA Medical Center spokesman Christopher Goodman confirmed the New York facility collected the samples and sent them to the lab. He would not comment on the findings, but said everyone who tested positive was notified.

Gerry Wiggins, who served in Vietnam from 1968 to 1969, has already lost friends to the disease. He was among those who got the call.

“I was in a state of shock,” he said. “I didn’t think it would be me.”

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Find the Vet Center near you

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Find the Vet Center near you by visiting Explore.VA.gov or clicking on the button below. Vet Center Call Center counseling is also available 24/7 at (1 877 927 8387).

Flimming & Flamming: VA Secretary Signals New Support For Privatized Care For Veterans

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“The direction I’m taking this is to give veterans more choice in their care,” Veterans Affairs Secretary David Shulkin says. The issue is a hot-button topic for those involved in veterans' advocacy.

The Wall Street Journal: Veterans Affairs Chief Wants Bigger Role For Private Health Care The top official at the Department of Veterans Affairs said he wants private-sector providers to play a larger role in veterans’ health care, a view likely to draw opposition for a Trump cabinet member who has enjoyed rare bipartisan support. David Shulkin said in an interview that he wants to make the VA’s hospital system compete with private-sector providers for military veteran customers, which he said would give veterans greater choice over their health care. (Kesling and Nicholas, 11/20)

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Founder of Veterans Outreach Center dies following brain cancer battle

Rochester, N.Y. (13WHAM) - The local veteran community is mourning the loss of one of itsbiggest advocates. Tom Cray died on Friday at the age of 67.

Cray served two combat tours with the U.S. Navy during the Vietnam war. When he returned to Rochester, he helped create the Veterans Outreach Center (VOC). He spent nearly four decades advocating for veteran's rights and helping many reintegrate back into the civilian world.

Through the center, Tom also helped local veterans find help with employment, benefits counseling and much more until his retirement from the organization in 2010.

"He was a special person, he had a vision that most people certainly at that time didn’t have and today don’t have," said current VOC executive director Laura Stradley. "But he had the commitment and the drive to see it through and make a tremendous impact on thousands and thousands of veterans in this region."

Laura also stressed Tom's work to help veterans suffering from Post Traumatic Stress Disorder (PTSD) before the illness was widely understood and treated.

"Our country went through a dark period when we couldn’t separate the war from the warrior, and Tom knew that, and he did everything in his power to make sure the warriors that came back knew they had a home and knew they could get services," said Stradley.

Tom was diagnosed with a brain cancer known as glioblastoma earlier this year. His illness sparked new efforts to help Vietnam War veterans who are suffering from brain cancer because of exposure to Agent Orange."

Thomas Cray,founder of the Veterans Outreach Center in Rochester and a Vietnam Veteran, has died.

His doctors believed his brain cancer was linked to Agent Orange exposure during his two tours in Vietnam.

Cray, 67, founded the Veterans Outreach Center after his time in the Navy. He directed the center for nearly 40 years.

"Tom Cray served his brother and sister veterans in Monroe County with intensity and passion," said Todd Baxter, former executive director of the center. "Tom pushed this community out of our comfort zone when taking care of veterans was not popular. Because of Tom, the Veterans Outreach Center was born and is now the oldest local non-profit in America serving veterans. Tom will never be replaced and will always be remembered."