
                         Roanoke Times
                 Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.

DATE: SATURDAY, May 19, 1990                   TAG: 9005190291
SECTION: NATIONAL/INTERNATIONAL                    PAGE: A-1   EDITION: METRO 
SOURCE: The Washington Post
DATELINE: WASHINGTON                                LENGTH: Short

U.S. ADMITS DEFOLIANT LIKELY CARCINOGEN

The government acknowledged Friday that exposure to Agent Orange, the defoliant used widely during the Vietnam War, may have caused cancers among the 3.1 million U.S. military personnel who served in Southeast Asia.

Veterans groups hailed the decision by Veterans Affairs Secretary Edward Derwinski as a breakthrough in their decade-long, often emotional fight over whether the herbicide has caused a wide variety of cancers, neurological conditions and birth defects.

Until Friday's decision, the government had acknowledged that Agent Orange, a chemical that contains the carcinogen dioxin, could be linked to chloracne, a severe skin rash.

It had rejected compensation claims for other illnesses on the grounds that scientific proof of their relationship to Vietnam service was lacking. Because the defoliant was widely used to destroy forests there, the government has taken the position that anyone who served in Vietnam could have been exposed to the chemical.

by CNB