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New Study Shows “Agent Orange” Caused Hypertension among U.S. Vietnam Veterans

WASHINGTON – The news broke a few days ago in the nation’s capital, and it wasn’t good.

According to a just published medical study, the highly toxic herbicide known as “Agent Orange” left many Vietnam War combat veterans with an ailment that had’t previously been linked to the poisonous defoliant: Hypertension.

The alarming new study, reported in November by Medical Press, blames soaring rates of hypertension among Vietnam Vets on the dioxin that served as the killing agent in the widely used Agent Orange.

Somewhere between 2 and 3 million Vietnam veterans may have been exposed to dioxin over the course of the war, according to recent estimates.
Known more familiarly as “high blood pressure,” hypertension can trigger heart disease, stroke and even fatal heart attacks, if ineffectively treated in patients.

~ Douglas Volk

»Posted by on Dec 10, 2018

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Homeless Vietnam Veterans Need Our Help . . . Now!

It’s one of the most depressing statistics in the grim history of the Vietnam War.

75,000.

That’s the estimated number of Vietnam-era veterans who now sleep on the streets of America each night.

Published by the National Coalition for the Homeless (http://www.nationalhomeless.org/factsheets/veterans.html),  the latest numbers on homelessness among Vietnam-era vets speak volumes about the psychological damage that was done to U.S. combat soldiers during the 1960s and 1970s.

According to the latest national data, more than three-fourths of these homeless Vietnam-era vets are struggling with problems related to alcohol or drug abuse.

Question: How long are we going to put up with this continuing national tragedy–before we decide to commit the resources that will be required to solve the problem?

[Douglas Volk is the author of The Morpheus Conspiracy, a novel that describes the nightmare world inhabited by many returning Vietnam War combat veterans. To learn more about The Morpheus Conspiracy, visit https://www.themorpheusseries.com. ]

»Posted by on Dec 8, 2018

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Why Are So Many U.S. Military Veterans Committing Suicide Each Day?

 Ever found yourself wondering how many of America’s 20 million military veterans commit suicide each day in America?
 The frightening answer from the latest research compiled by the U.S. Government is 22, on average.
 A heartbreaking number?
 You bet it is.
 “What we’re seeing now is an extraordinary tragedy which speaks to the horror of war and the need for us to do a much better job of assisting our soldiers,” says Vermont Senator Bernie Sanders, the chair of the Senate Veterans Affairs Committee.
Adds Representative Jeff Miller of Florida, the chair of the House VA Committee: “We will be holding a hearing in February to determine if the VA’s system of mental health and suicide prevention services is improving the health and wellness of our heroes in need.”
According to VA researchers, the average age of a veteran who commits suicide is 60, and the usual method is a drug overdose or self-inflicted poisoning. Those two events now account for about half of the deaths each year.
In a so-far-unsuccessful effort to stem the tide of veteran suicides, VA recently created a task force that is now looking for innovative solutions to this frightening epidemic. VA has also recently launched a “crisis hotline” in which trained experts use their special skills to help suicidal vets get the the psychological assistance they so desperately need. The VA is also expanding its mental health staff by more than 1,500 clinicians.
So far, however, the number of veteran suicides keeps rising slowly each year . . . and according to the experts, the reasons behind the alarming trend aren’t clear.
But one thing does seem certain: the nation needs to pay much more attention to this growing — and tragic — trend among millions of American heroes who served their country well and deserve our help — ASAP.     
Douglas Volk

»Posted by on Nov 29, 2018

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