August 10, 2022 by Nick Meyer and GMO/Toxin Free USA Staff
The health effects of glyphosate, the infamous and ubiquitous chemical in Bayer-Monsanto’s Roundup weedkiller, are still being brought to light, but that’s just the tip of the iceberg when it comes to the damage Monsanto and Bayer’s creations have caused.
Over 50 years later and more than 8,500 miles away, yet another toxic Monsanto creation is still, to this day, wreaking havoc on the health of the innocent citizens of Vietnam.
The Devastating, Persistent History of Agent Orange in Vietnam
The infamous Agent Orange herbicide was sprayed on the jungles of Vietnam by U.S. military forces for 10 years (1961-1971) during the Vietnam war. Agent Orange was used as a defoliant to clear forests that provided cover for North Vietnamese forces and to destroy their crops, depriving them of food. The toxic and corrosive chemical has persisted in the environment for decades and its lethal legacy of health harms continues.
Doctors have begun stepping forward over the last few years with claims that millions of Vietnam’s children still face life threatening health problems because of the presence of the deadly chemical and the genetic damage and defects passed on for generations.
Reporter Aide Adepitan of Unreported World, a documentary program broadcast by UK Channel 4, released a 23-minute investigation and news segment detailing the ongoing, destructive legacy of Agent Orange in Vietnam.
“The people that caused such crimes, they don’t recognize their responsibility. For example, the chemical companies, they are still there and they don’t have any responsibility. I think everybody must get angry with them,” urges Dr. Nguyen Thi Ngoc Phuong, featured in the documentary:
Agent Orange was manufactured and supplied to the U.S. military by Monsanto and eight other U.S. chemical companies. The chemical formula was made up of two toxic herbicides, 2,4-D (2,4-Dichlorophenoxyacetic acid), and 2,4,5-T (2,4,5-Trichlorophenoxyacetic acid) in equal proportions. Dioxin, one of the most toxic and persistent chemicals known to man, was a contaminant byproduct of the manufacturing process, making Agent Orange even more deadly. Not only was Monsanto the U.S. military’s top supplier, but their formulation was also found to contain the highest levels of dioxin.
Over time, it has been proven that this chemical concoction caused an abnormally high incidence of serious health issues that include miscarriages, cancer, birth defects and congenital malformations, diabetes, skin rashes/diseases, and devastating neurological and psychological problems among generations of Vietnamese people.
Of the 20 million gallons of herbicides sprayed, 13 million gallons of Agent Orange were dumped on the jungles and other areas of Vietnam, blanketing the land with the toxic concoction. Agent Orange remains a persistent environmental contaminant today.
In 2018, six years after the first direct United States-sponsored cleanup of Agent Orange remnants in the country, Vietnam finally announced its demands to be compensated for the damage that has been caused by the toxic weapon of war.
The country cited the $289 million dollar verdict in favor of glyphosate-exposed and cancer-stricken U.S. groundskeeper Dewayne “Lee” Johnson as inspiration for its demands.
“The [U.S.] verdict serves as a legal precedent which refutes previous claims that the herbicides made by Monsanto and other chemical corporations in the U.S. and provided for the U.S. army in the war are harmless,” said foreign minister Nguyen Phuong Tra at the time.
“Vietnam has suffered tremendous consequences from the war, especially with regard to the lasting and devastating effects of toxic chemicals, including Agent Orange.”
The Devastating, Persistent History of Agent Orange in America
While the Vietnamese people have suffered most tremendously from Monsanto et al’s Agent Orange, military service members, including hundreds of thousands of U.S. veterans and their offspring also continue to carry the health burdens of the U.S. military’s use of the chemical.
It doesn’t stop there. Production of synthetic herbicides also leaves a legacy of environmental contamination. In the U.S., Agent Orange is connected to many designated Superfund sites.
What is a Superfund site? The “Superfund” started out as a trust fund created by Congress in 1980 to finance cleanups, paid for by billions of dollars in taxes on the chemical and petroleum industries. A Superfund site is an ultra-toxic, chemically contaminated manufacturing site.
Here are some locations of Agent Orange Superfund sites:
- Nitro, WV (Monsanto)
- Midland and Saginaw, MI (Dow Chemical)
- Newark, NJ (Diamond Shamrock Corp.)
- Jacksonville, AR (Hercules, Inc.)
Wartime Chemicals are Being Used as Weedkillers in Conventional Farming
While Agent Orange’s full chemical formula is no longer used, half of the formula, the herbicide 2,4-D, is its legacy. The Agent Orange component 2,4-D herbicide, is sprayed directly on GMO herbicide-tolerant crops and in yards where children and pets play. 2,4-D is the most widely used herbicide in non-agricultural settings. This has activists and healthy living advocates concerned.
Although EPA states that dioxins are “no longer found in detectable levels in 2,4-D products sold in the United States,” 2,4-D has proven to be dangerous on its own.
Safety Concerns Abound as 2,4-D Use Continues to Increase in the United States
Peer-reviewed research on the potentially harmful effects of 2,4-D products was compiled by GMO/Toxin Free USA and is included in the GMOResearch.org database.
In 2014, government approval was granted for Dow Chemical’s Enlist Duo weedkiller, which is comprised of two harsh pesticides: 2,4-D and glyphosate. Glyphosate was declared a probable human carcinogen by the International Agency for Research on Cancer (IARC) in 2015.
According to a 2022 report from The Guardian, 2,4-D is also widely used on golf courses, despite warnings from the IARC that the herbicide is a ‘possible human carcinogen’.
Meanwhile, the chemical is accumulating in people’s bodies as the use of 2,4-D has ratcheted up. An independent 2022 study in the journal Environmental Health found that the herbicide accumulates inside the human body, and is most often found in children and women of childbearing age (20-44). To date, USDA has failed to include 2,4-D in their food testing for pesticides – the Annual Pesticide Data Program (PDP). This new study increases the urgency of such testing.
“Agricultural use of 2,4-D has increased substantially from a low point in 2002 and it is predicted to increase further in the coming decade,” the study authors said.
“Because increasing use is likely to increase population level exposures, the associations seen here between 2,4-D crop application and biomonitoring levels require focused biomonitoring and epidemiological evaluation to determine the extent to which rising use and exposures cause adverse health outcomes among vulnerable populations (particularly children and women of childbearing age) and highly exposed individuals (farmers, other herbicide applicators, and their families),” the 2022 study concluded.
The EPA’s website states that the agency has been re-evaluating the safety of 2,4-D, and that the chemical is undergoing a registration review.
More questions persist, as research demonstrating potential harm has piled up. The increasing use of multiple pesticide combinations is also cause for concern as science tells us that combinations are likely more toxic than the individual chemicals on their own.
It appears as if the full extent of harm caused by these chemical cocktails might not be known for quite some time — long after the worst of the damage has been done, if history is any indication.
What Can You Do to Help?
- Urge Congress to pass H.R. 3518, the Victims of Agent Orange Relief Act, which would help the children of U.S. veterans, Vietnamese Americans, and.the Vietnamese people. TAKE ACTION to support H.R. 3518 the Victims of Agent Orange Relief Act.
- Are you a Vietnam-era veteran or know a Vietnam-era veteran affected by Agent Orange?
The PACT Act, a bill signed into law by President Biden on Agent Orange Awareness Day, August 10, 2022, expands health care benefits to millions of military veterans, and includes an expansion of coverage for Vietnam-era veterans affected by Agent Orange.
The law includes two new presumptive illnesses from Agent Orange – high blood pressure (also called hypertension) and monoclonal gammopathy of undetermined significance (MGUS) – and greatly expands the locations for presumptive Agent Orange exposure. In addition, the law includes three new areas which are presumptive for radiation exposure.
Detailed information is now available on the U.S. Department of Veterans Affairs website: https://www.va.gov/resources/the-pact-act-and-your-va-benefits/#vietnam-era-veteran-eligibilit
We need to stop putting chemicals into our environment! Chemicals are causing devastating health impacts!
Look what we’re doing to children and the environment! All because of greed! This is shameful and must be stopped!
Both Democrats and Republicans should be ashamed of their selves for not getting rid of Bayer Monsanto’s horrible chemicals on our food, school play yards and anywhere else. We continue to deal with horrible effects from these chemicals that they know causes cancer as well as many other diseases. They need to stop this once and for all. Why is it they won’t stand up to these chemical giants?
Continue in your endeavors to find the truth and obtain justice.
Attended a lecture by Nobel Prize winner George Wald yrs ago. He related an event where nuclear weapons industry executives were asked why they continued producing nuclear weapons if in a nuclear war, their children would be as affected as all others on the planet. Consensus was that whether or not that was the likely outcome someone was going to make money on nuclear production in the meantime. May as well be us. The greed of the corporate executive in the face of planetary destruction continues to astound and confound those of us coming from a place of compassion and love for the natural world. We must end this insanity.
This is beyond sanity!! They have enough blood money, it must be stopped!
This is the result of a few families who wish to make your life (current day), into a living hell – They will stop at nothing to achieve their desired result!
https://stateofthenation2012.com/?p=133074 Worth the visit.
Stop them, we gain control of what our Creator intended – Beautiful lands, good health, plenty of love and the freedom to choose all of the above.
Love and Light ~
Per mediabiasfactcheck.com
Overall, we rate State of the Nation (SOTN) extreme right biased and Questionable based on the promotion of propaganda, conspiracy theories, and pseudoscience and the use of poor sources, a complete lack of transparency, and false claims. (D. Van Zandt 1/13/2017) Updated (10/25/2021)
The worst chemicals are the demonicrat regime of izlamocrats, pedocrats, communistocrats, nwocrats, globalistocrats, abominationocrats and all evils
I have been fighting for a chemical free environment for many years. Its gotten worse instead of better and the chemicals now are stronger.
Democrats and Republicans and all those who are aware of Agent Orange being used on our food should be protesting from the rooftops. Shame on our representatives in Congress for not getting rid of Bayer Monsanto’s horrible chemicals in our food, school play yards, plastics and many other places. Vietnam Vets got the worst of it and suffer still from this poison. And now still the American public continues to be beset with the horrible effects from these chemicals that are known to cause cancer as well as many other diseases. Our government, and especially the gov agencies in charge of protecting the public from toxins and bad food practices, destructive farming practices, etc. (or that was their original purpose now seem to be protecting those producers of such poisons instead) need to stop allowing these chemicals once and for all. Many other countries that care about their people over profits, do ban these chemicals. Why is it in America the government favors these chemical giants over the health of their food and their citizens?
Horrific.
We should be ashamed and we need to take action.
Geoengineering is even larger than spraying Agent Orange over the Ho Chi Minh Trail during the Vietnam War. Please see the documentary film THE DIMMING for an introduction. https://www.geoengineeringwatch.org/the-dimming-full-length-climate-engineering-documentary/