Deceptive VA Poster – Created to Block C-123 Agent Orange Exposure Claims

The 1991 Agent Orange Act, Title 38 and Federal Register publications combine to, in the VA's own words, "make clear" the fact that veterans exposed to military herbicides will be treated the same as Vietnam veterans for presumptive service connection. The key word: exposed.

The VA mission: redefine exposure so veterans' exposures would not be exposures to the VA.

This they did at the 2012 Society of Toxicology. VA surrendered ethics to policy, and redefined exposure to prevent exposure being acknowledged for C-123 veterans' claims. Of course, careful reading of their redefinition makes clear VA can apply it to consideration of any exposure...radiation, other toxins, biological hazards, burn pits...anything.

The was deceptive. Its title promised an historical perspective on Agent Orange and an update. This was done, but the key objective was inserting their deceptive redefinition to block exposure claims by C-123 veterans. Thus, "exposure = contamination field + bioavailability." Wrong. Wrong in every way.

Bad science. The words used by scientists on reading it: ludicrous, unscientific, preposterous!

The words used by VA raters on reading it while considering C-123 claims: Claim denied! Any excuse will suffice to prevent exposure claims at Veterans Benefits Administration.

We make special observation at the title of a key section of VA's poster: "Risk Assessment of Post-Vietnam C-123 Aircraft."

Two points:
1. Actually, who cares from a claims perspective, as risk is irrelevant. The issue is exposure, and thus the section title should have been, "Exposure Assessment of Post-Vietnam C-123 Aircraft."
2. The risk assessment is unscientific, and recently challenged by the Environmental Science article. This means C-123 veterans are at risk for health issues which their civilian and VA physicians must be aware of, yet VA's unscientific poster pretends no health risks exist, a position taken only to save VA the cost of such care and only by pretending VA has the wherewithal to redefine fundamental terms in science for employment against their veteran clients' interests.

So far, job well done! Universal claims denial, with a neat circle of initial invitation to exposed veterans to submit claims, the inquiry to JSRRC with their response (VA edited, and VA-limited as to what can be fed back to VA,) followed by the referral for opinion from Compensation and Pension and their boilerplate denials, concluding in the claim's final denial letter to the veteran.

As both VBA and VHA intend, this wastes as much as two years, and that's a terrific built-in benefit for the VA as it keeps the doors locked against the C-123 vets. It saves VA money, more of us die, and then the BVA appeal is designed to lock those VA hospital doors for another two to three years. More of us die. Then, after what has been a four to seven year process, receive a BVA decision...always affirming...and can survivors walk (if they still can) into the VA hospital and get on the waiting list for treatment of our cancers, heart disease and other ailments we had been suffering when we first applied for care.

All this from their simple, unique redefinition of "exposure." We trust their annual reviews reflected the pride VA had on the skillful wordsmithing and other accomplishments the staff in Post Deployment Health exhibited in responding to the VA agenda of preventing C-123 claims...or perhaps even implementing that policy on their own.

Wouldn't want any papers left laying around for some FOIA miner, would they?

Veterans Ask Society of Toxicology for "Equal Time"

In our earlier posts we explained how VA used the Society of Toxicology poster display they presented
to redefine the scientific term "exposure." To prevent veterans from coverage for Agent Orange illnesses, VA redefined exposure to "Exposure = Contamination Field + Bioavailability."

This is incorrect. Exposure is defined everywhere as contact by the skin with a contaminant, or its inhalation or ingestion. There is no requirement for bioavailability, which is the VA's attempt to reintroduce medical nexus as a requirement for Agent Orange coverage – and this was prohibited by the 1991 Agent Orange Act and Title 38! The Federal Register specifically provides for our benefits.

The Association has approached the Society of Toxicology for some sort of platform for us to challenge the VA's unscientific, policy-driven poster presentation. The request to the SOT's president follows:

Dear Doctor Lehman-McKeeman,

We seek SOT assistance regarding the poster display submitted by the VA at an earlier conference, which addressed Agent Orange and our exposure aboard contaminated C-123 transport aircraft. 

We believe the science in the poster was flawed and policy-driven, to the point of redefining the term "exposure" to require bioavailability. This incorrect VA redefinition thus denies all our veterans' Agent Orange exposure claims. This definition defies that of the SOT, ATSDR, EPA and others. 

I earlier asked SOT's help with this but without response. The Washington Post, Huffington Post, Fox News, UPI and other sources have recently covered this sensitive issue, but the core of it is the VA's SOT poster standing unchallenged by SOT. 

I ask that SOT consider the attached article, edited for a more appropriate tone, as a layman's SOT essay. I ask that I be given permission to present at the 2014 conference on this topic, repeating what I said at the January Institute of Medicine meeting. 

At the very least, I ask that The C-123 Veterans' Association be permitted to submit a poster display addressing this issue. 

The VA used their SOT poster as their pulpit to deny over 2000 veterans coverage for Agent Orange benefits. The question of the medical or legal impact of the dioxin exposure is not at hand, only the word "exposure." 

VA has opted to redefine that without challenge by SOT. VA used SOT as a vehicle against our interests, used toxicological concepts which should have been challenged, and we are entitled to our response. 

Alternately, can you invite input from a recognized authority, perhaps an interested SOT member? 

I hope I can your help with this, as earlier suggested by Dr. Birnbaum. VA redefining science to oppose our claims should not remain unchallenged by toxicologists.

Sincerely,

Wesley T. Carter, Major, USAF Retired, Medical Service Corps
Chair, The C-123 Veterans Association

attached: "VA Redefines Science to Deny Agent Orange Claims" 

Veterans Benefits Administration REDEFINES Science to Prevent Agent Orange Claims

PART ONE: The Grand Deception
A simple line deep in the middle of a poster presentation offered at the Society of Toxicology convention is where VA did it to the C-123 veterans, and other vets exposed to Agent Orange in situations other than "boots on the ground" during Vietnam. Here is where VA showed its eagerness to prevent service-disabled veterans from, as VA and DOD consultants have put it, becoming "freeloaders looking for a tax-free dollar from a sympathetic congressman."

The Society of Toxicology invites poster displays as well as scientific and medical presentations from members, and VA's Veterans Benefits Administration and Veterans Health Administration prepared their large poster for that San Francisco meeting.

Their objective: enjoy a freebee trip to the Golden Gate city justified on the basis of doing something useful like the poster, but also engineer a special way to skirt the law and insure Agent Orange veterans, in particular, C-123 veterans, all be denied exposure benefits clearly provided for by law. What law? The Agent Orange Act of 1991, and also Title 38, as well as the 8 May 2001 Federal Register, page 23166 which has the force of regulation.

These laws, regulations and announcements provide that veterans exposed to military herbicides will receive exposure benefits without requirement that they provide proof of medical nexus...which is virtually impossible for any individual to do. Think here of a non-smoker getting lung cancer. Where and when cannot be proved with today's science, but it surely came from somewhere. Same here with military herbicide exposure and the "Agent Orange" presumptives, a list of illnesses acknowledged the the VA and the National Academy of Science/Institute of Medicine to be associated with dioxin exposure.

Seems simple enough. Exposure proof would result in claim approval. Nope! Faced with the possibility of C-123 veterans continuing their legitimate pursuit of essential, life-saving medical treatment for Agent Orange illnesses, VA executives realized that the Agency needed to focus on exposure. The Air Force had already determined that C-123s used for spraying Agent Orange during the Vietnam War remained contaminated ("heavily contaminated on all test surfaces" and "a danger to public health" read the AF toxicology reports.) That left the VA weak on any challenge to the fact of contamination of the aircraft, and any veteran's confirmed diagnosis of an Agent Orange illness prevented any challenge on that issue, so the only approach would be to deny the exposure itself.

VHA Poster Display

Here is where VA gets amazingly creative. Simply disregarding the law, and challenging the entire world of science and medicine, Veterans Health Administration utilized the Society of Toxicology conference to present a non-juried poster display entitled "AGENT ORANGE: 50-Year History and Newest Chapter of Concerns." Folks, C-123 veterans were cited as the VA's "chapter of concerns." Folks, the "concern" was the VA's in dread of eligible veterans actually receiving the benefits to which our Agent Orange exposure entitles us!

So somebody at 810 Vermont Avenue, Washington D.C.  got the clever idea, "Let's redefine the word "exposure" to prevent any exposed veteran from ever being approved. Let's pretend, just here at the VA, that "exposure" will mean something extra...that "exposure," the simple and precise word used in the various laws, will mean only what we say it means. And that definition is going to be that "exposure equals contaminant plus bioavailability." This way, with our special private redefinition, we can pretend that the laws of the United States do not apply, that science, logic and justice do not apply, and we can once again require proof of medical nexus!"

VA associates us much too closely with the tens of thousands of Blue Water Navy veterans, and VA is frightened that approving C-123 vets will lead to approving Blue Water Navy also.

Midway down the SOT poster made up by the VA, left column, at the fourth paragraph, the reader comes to the alarming deception employed by VA's Post Deployment Health staffers who wrote this poster. C-123 Veterans Association leaders encountered them all at the March 2013 conference hosted by Senator Burr's staff as we tried to find common ground. Sadly, this non-juried piece of policy-driven verbiage is the result!

Read carefully, won't you? Chew carefully on the highlighted items. We'll discuss this vicious VA deceptions in our next post. Meantime, Google words like "medical nexus, "exposure," and take a moment to read Page 23166 of the 8 May 2001 Federal Register, the last section of the middle column. Very revealing!

Text of Presentation to Institute of Medicine Agent Orange Committee

January 16, 2013  University of California - Irvine

The presentation of the C-123 Veterans Association to the Agent Orange Committee, Institute of Medicine of the National Academies has been finalized and generally agreed upon by a wide variety of skill sets within our ranks...flight nurses, pilots, maintenance, crew chiefs, and more. I even was blessed with a last-minute read by a gentleman at the church we're visiting who indeed read it as he promised, and found four essential corrections - including one where I typed "between 1072-1982" meaning, of course, 1972-1982. It lends a bit more credence to not have silly mistakes like this, and thanks to all who reviewed, especially Karlene, John and Paul.

 It will be delivered 16 January 2013 at the Academy's conference center at the University of California - Irvine. Our objective is merely to acquaint the committee with the C-123 contamination, the exposure of the veterans, and the means by which the Department of Veterans Affairs opposes claims regardless of merit.

While the time for our presentation is brief, handouts are invited and we've prepared an extensively detailed summary, including a two-page hyperlinked appendix to our reference documents, just so they know we're not making this stuff up! Also included is a 2.6GB DVD with every source document I could find from AF, GSA, VA, general aviation, wherever to hopefully tell our story.


We have been cautioned that the committee can only deal with peer-reviewed scientific materials, and we've shown them plenty. We'll show them unchallenged AF and commercial lab testing of C-123s between 1979 and 2009, both with hexane and with water wipes, and both positive for dioxin. I hope they can find enough science and already-accepted material in earlier IOM reports to bear on our newly added items, and be motivated enough to take on the VA...and I don't care if it is face-to-face or behind the scenes, just so long as the IOM takes the VA to task on their ridiculous anti-C-123 veteran posture.