Veterans May Receive Contamination Benefits (Camp Lejeune)

[douglas9]

WASHINGTON (CN) - The Department of Veteran Affairs has proposed rules implementing a law requiring it to provide health care for veterans who were exposed to contaminated water while serving at Camp Lejeune in North Carolina.
In the early 1980s, two water-supply systems on the U.S. Marine Corps base were found to be contaminated with trichloroethylene, a metal degreaser, and perchloroethylene, a dry cleaning agent, as well as benzene, vinyl chloride and other compounds. The water systems were contaminated for over 30 years, between August 1957 and December 1987, according to the VA's action.
Some of the chemicals were linked to an off-base dry-cleaning business, which has since closed, but Marine Corps industrial waste practices are also a cause of the contamination, along with leaking fuel storage tanks, according to the Centers for Disease Control's Agency for Toxic Substances and Disease Registry.
A 2010 Congressional hearing on the issue revealed that at least 1 million gallons of benzene alone leaked into drinking water at the base.

http://www.courthousenews.com/2013/09/19/61311.htm

[unhappycamper]

1. Thanks - k&r

[peacebird]

2. They just sent me a list of the 15 medical conditions drinking the water could have given you.

My dad died of one (lung cancer) 24 years ago, mom had breast cancer 16 years ago but died in August of a myleodysplastic syndrome. All three diseases were on the list of 15. We lived there from 1964 - 1967.