Agent Orange Research Paper

AGENT ORANGE

Agent Orange has been one of the most toxic herbicides and carcinogens to humans to have ever been made. In the late 1960s and early 1970s, Agent Orange was an herbicide that was used to clear out the Vietnamese jungle. The jungle was crucial to the success of early Vietnamese victories because it provided cover for their guerilla tactics that involved poking in and out of the jungle and striking for shorts bits of time, taking the United States armies by surprise. The jungle also provided the Vietnamese with food, and it was their primary food source. The United States believed that if they were able to remove their jungle in massive amounts, they would be able to quickly vanquish the Vietnamese, and bring their troops home from

The Vietnam War was the hardest times of their life for some people due to the stress of knowing if their family members were coming, and because they could watch the war from home, including the many executions of American soldiers that were shown on live TV. 10 years into this war, it was still a stalemate and America wanted to bring their troops home. They had understood how the Vietnamese were able to take so many decisive battles by attacking from the jungle, and eventually they had to bring it to an end if they wanted to win the war. By the mid 1960s, Agent Orange was being produced by the Monsanto Company, in order to wipe out the jungle, and destroy the Vietnamese cover, and food. According to the Monsanto Company themselves (n.d.), “From 1965 to 1969, the former Monsanto Company manufactured Agent Orange for the U.S. military as a wartime government contractor.” They also have accepted partial responsibility for everyone who is now affected by negative Agent Orange. People in America obviously thought that this would be a good idea because the war had been going on for over 10 years, and people were desperate to bring their family home. The solution also sounded ingenious because there were no direct effects on human health at the time, and the herbicide was produced on an innocent

According to Agent Orange Record (n.d.) “The Vietnam Red Cross estimates that 3 million Vietnamese have been affected by Agent Orange, including 150,000 children born with birth defects.” The birth defects often show as face disfigurations or limb disfigurations, and veterans encounter different cancers such as Soft Tissue Sarcoma, respiratory cancer, and prostate cancer. There are other diseases associated with Agent Orange as well, such as Parkinson’s disease, Ischemic heart disease and AL Amyloidosis. Many veterans in America and Vietnam still suffer from symptoms related to Agent Orange, and there are countless birth defects that clearly relate to Agent Orange, however there is still little research about cures and treatments for the problems that they run into. There have been few studies around toxicology and Agent Orange, but most of it has fizzled out to nothing because there is so little knowledge and funding. The most recent method used in Vietnam to cure Agent Orange symptoms is known as detoxification. Detoxification consists of taking various vitamins and mineral, strenuous exercise, and sweating in a sauna. These efforts are aimed towards purging the body of dioxin through sweat and other excrements, in turn removing the negative effects, but it is only an acute study, and they have not been able to monitor any major results. However, Dr. Marcella Warner, a research epidemiologist who studies