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- NATION, Page 25American NotesVETERANSPaying for Agent Orange
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- Vietnam veterans won another skirmish last week in the battle
- over Agent Orange, but the government continues to hold its
- ground. For 14 years now, veterans' groups have charged that the
- herbicide used to defoliate the jungle canopy was toxic to
- soldiers. More than 35,000 have filed claims for diseases like
- cancer and birth defects in their children. Last week the
- Department of Veterans Affairs announced that a limited number
- of vets who contracted peripheral neuropathy, a nervous disease
- that causes numbness and tingling, within 10 years of their
- service will be allowed disability payments of up to $1,620 a
- month.
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- That marked the second victory this year: in February the
- VA awarded similar payments to vets with non-Hodgkin's lymphoma
- and soft-tissue sarcoma, two forms of cancer. But the
- government continues to reject claims that Agent Orange causes
- lung cancer, and veterans argue that the VA imposes so many
- restrictions that few survivors will actually benefit.
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