How does agent orange work

Veterans with service-connected conditions related to Agent Orange may be eligible for specific health care benefits from VA. Children of veterans who were exposed to Agent Orange may also be eligible for some healthcare benefits, specifically if they have one of the following birth defects:.

If you are granted service connection for a medical condition due to Agent Orange exposure, your monthly compensation amounts will depend on your VA disability rating. VA disability ratings are assigned based on the severity of your condition.

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This will open your email client. Print this page. We refer to this as retroactive payment. File a claim for disability compensation. To learn more about this change in the law, and how it may affect you, download our:. Note: Please be ready to give us your name, email address, telephone number, and VA file number or Social Security number.

This is a free health exam for Veterans who meet any of the above service requirements for presumption of contact. Contact your local VA environmental health coordinator. Learn more about the Agent Orange Registry health exam. If you served in Vietnam or Thailand, or in or near the Korean DMZ—and your child has spina bifida or certain other birth defects—find out if your child qualifies for disability benefits.

If you served during the Vietnam War, you may be at risk of certain health conditions. Learn about these conditions and what to do next to take care of your health. Review and print documents from your official military personnel file including your DD Set up your personal health record.

And download medical records, reports, and images to share with your VA and non-VA providers. Get instructions for how to prepare and apply for VA health care online, by phone, by mail, or in person. Disability benefits. Exposure to hazardous materials. In this section. We've added 3 more presumptive conditions related to Agent Orange exposure This expands benefits for Veterans and survivors with these presumptive conditions: Bladder cancer Hypothyroidism Parkinsonism If we denied your claim for any of these conditions in the past, we'll automatically review your case again.

Both of these must be true. Requirements for Agent Orange presumptive diseases When sound medical and scientific evidence shows that an illness is caused by Agent Orange exposure, we add it to our list of presumptive diseases. Newspaper articles about the ill effects of Agent Orange, particularly against the U. Prominent scientists argued that the deployment of herbicides was an immoral use of chemical weapons [source: Buckingham ].

So why did the U. In this article, we'll look at why Agent Orange was used, its effects on the environment and human health, and its complicated legacy. We'll also examine dioxin, the deadly compound that continues to pollute the Vietnamese countryside. Other uses of Agent Orange included destroying crops that the Viet Cong relied on for food. The Vietnam War wasn't the first use of herbicides in war -- for example, the British deployed herbicides against Malaysian rebels in the s -- but it was by far the most ambitious.

When deployed, Agent Orange kills vegetation of all types, destroying roots as well. Leaves die and fall off, transforming a thick forest into a mass of barren trees. Once green areas turn black. A sharp, unpleasant odor fills the air [source: Glaberson ].

The same principle is applied to Agent Orange. Plants subjected to Agent Orange die because the substance contains an excess of growth regulators that cause plant tissue to grow too rapidly and for plants to dry out [source: Buckingham ].

The topsoil, so vital to supporting thick jungle growth, disappeared after the monsoon rains without plant life to anchor it [source: Aschwanden ]. Invasive species of grasses appeared, hindering the regrowth of the environment's native plant life. The agricultural industry, a major part of Vietnam's economy and its people's livelihood, was ravaged. And into the soil seeped large quantities of dioxin, a deadly substance that we'll look at on the next page.

Galston, whose research led to the creation of Agent Orange, once said, "Nothing that you do in science is guaranteed to result in benefits for mankind. Any discovery, I believe, is morally neutral, and it can be turned either to constructive or destructive ends. That's not the fault of science" [source: Pearce ]. Small doses of dioxin may actually decrease the incidence of certain cancers , but in anything above small doses, dioxin has been linked to numerous, potentially deadly health problems.

The World Health Organization has classified dioxin as a "known human carcinogen" that can damage essential bodily systems, such as the endocrine, immune and nervous systems [source: WHO ]. It also has been linked with miscarriages in women [source: Bertazzi et al ]. Studies of people exposed to dioxins through workplace accidents have been found to have an increased risk of cancer about 40 percent [source: GreenFacts ]. Studies of dioxin on animals have yielded similar adverse health effects.

Dioxin develops as a byproduct of some industrial processes, usually those that involve something being burned, like copper smelting or incinerating waste. It can also be manufactured synthetically, as it was during the Vietnam War [source: Schechner ]. When dioxin isn't contained, it seeps into the ground and the groundwater sources, polluting the local ecology and becoming part of the food chain. Dioxin pollution has, in general, decreased in recent years as government regulations have caused companies to make various industrial processes cleaner, but it remains a pressing issue in Vietnam [source: Dioxin Facts ].

When people eat animals and plants contaminated with dioxin, it begins accumulating in their fat tissue , since the poison is fat-soluble. It's unknown how long it takes dioxin to dissipate. Some forms of dioxin have half-lives lasting seven years or more, but more recent research shows that when found in large concentrations, dioxin takes far longer to decay [source: Dioxin Facts ]. And when dioxin seeps into soil, its half-life increases significantly [source: Dioxin Facts ].

After being poisoned, Yushchenko's appearance changed dramatically. His once youthful face became pockmarked, scarred and shaded an eerie green-grey. He had terrible pain in his torso, in part because of lesions that contributed to his facial scarring. It's amazing that he even survived. During the Vietnam War , the U. S military engaged in an aggressive program of chemical warfare codenamed Operation Ranch Hand. From to , the U. During this process, crops and water sources used by the non-combatant native population of South Vietnam were also hit.

In all, American forces used more than 20 million gallons of herbicides in Vietnam, Laos and Cambodia during the years of Operation Ranch Hand. Herbicides were also sprayed from trucks and hand-sprayers around U. The various herbicides used during Operation Ranch Hand were referred to by the colored marks on the gallon drums in which the chemicals were shipped and stored. In addition to Agent Orange, the U. Each of these—manufactured by Monsanto, Dow Chemical and other companies—had different chemical chemical additives in varying strengths.

Agent Orange was the most widely used herbicide in Vietnam, and the most potent. More than 13 million gallons of Agent Orange was used in Vietnam, or almost two-thirds of the total amount of herbicides used during the entire Vietnam War. It was found in varying concentrations in all the different herbicides used in Vietnam. Dioxins are also created from trash incineration; burning gas, oil and coal; cigarette smoking and in different manufacturing processes such as bleaching.

Dioxin is a highly persistent chemical compound that lasts for many years in the environment, particularly in soil, lake and river sediments and in the food chain. Dioxin accumulates in fatty tissue in the bodies of fish, birds and other animals.

Most human exposure is through foods such as meats, poultry, dairy products, eggs, shellfish and fish. Studies done on laboratory animals have proven that dioxin is highly toxic even in minute doses. It is universally known to be a carcinogen a cancer-causing agent. Short-term exposure to dioxin can cause darkening of the skin, liver problems and a severe acne-like skin disease called chloracne.

Additionally, dioxin is linked to type 2 diabetes, immune system dysfunction, nerve disorders, muscular dysfunction, hormone disruption and heart disease.