Exposed to Agent Orange at US Bases, Veterans Face Cancer Without VA Compensation

(By Hannah Norman and Patricia Kime for KFF Health News)

As a young GI at Fort Ord in Monterey County, California, Dean Osborn spent much of his time in the oceanside woodlands, training on soil and guzzling water from streams and aquifers now known to be contaminated with cancer-causing pollutants.

“They were marching the snot out of us,” he said, recalling his year and a half stationed on the base, from 1979 to 1980. He also remembers, not so fondly, the poison oak pervasive across the 28,000-acre installation that closed in 1994. He went on sick call at least three times because of the overwhelmingly itchy rash. Continue reading here…

Kaiser Health News is a nonprofit national health polity news service that is part of the nonpartisan Henry J. Kaiser Family Foundation

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