Clean Bill for Agent Orange

By ANDREW PURVIS

When U.S. Air Force flyers dumped millions of gallons of an oily herbicide called Agent Orange over the thick jungle canopy of war-ravaged Viet Nam, they unwittingly started a battle that would rage long after the last American helicopter left Saigon. Over the past 13 years, some 35,000 Viet Nam veterans have vigorously pressed Washington to compensate them for injuries and illnesses that they believe were caused by exposure to Agent Orange. The herbicide contains dioxin, a potent poison that causes cancer in laboratory animals. But Government officials have delayed paying most claims, pointing to a lack of scientific proof that Agent Orange hurt the soldiers. Last week researchers from the U.S. Centers for Disease Control issued a report designed to help resolve the controversy. For most of the stricken veterans, the news was not good.

The long-awaited five-year study found "no evidence" that Agent Orange injured soldiers in the field. The report did conclude that Viet Nam veterans are more likely than the general population to get a rare, fatal cancer called non-Hodgkin's lymphoma. But for some mysterious reason, the veterans who suffer from this cancer were predominantly sailors who were stationed off the Viet Nam shore and who had relatively little exposure to the defoliant. Even though the CDC could find no link between Agent Orange and increased cancer, Veterans Affairs Secretary Edward Derwinski immediately authorized compensation for about 1,800 Viet Nam veterans who have non-Hodgkin's lymphoma. They will receive monthly payments of up to $1,527.

That still leaves some 33,000 Agent Orange claimants who will get nothing, at least for now. They continue to maintain that the chemical is responsible for a jump in cancer among veterans and an increase in birth defects in their children. Julio Gonzales, 42, who served in Viet Nam for six months in 1969, feels sure that the series of disorders he has suffered since 1971, which include cancer of the bladder and problems with his kidneys and liver, was caused by Agent Orange. "The CDC can't see the forest for the trees," he says.

Dr. Dan Hoffman, coordinator of the CDC study, admits that scientists have not ruled out the possibility that those directly involved in handling and spraying Agent Orange were hurt by the herbicide. But he thinks that his agency's research clearly shows that most soldiers were not at risk. In response, veterans' groups have denounced the CDC study as poorly designed and irrelevant. "The CDC is a commendable research institution," says American Legion spokesman John Hanson, "but with this study, they dropped the ball."

There are legitimate questions about the CDC's methods. The best way to study the effects of Agent Orange would have been to single out those soldiers most exposed to the herbicide and compare their cancer rates with those in the ) unexposed population. But when the investigators tried to do this, says Dr. Hoffman, they could not reliably identify the soldiers who had received the highest doses. So instead the researchers adopted a more indirect approach, examining the incidence of six different cancers, including soft-tissue sarcoma and a kind of liver malignancy, that had been tentatively linked to herbicide exposure. Since the CDC settled for an indirect study, many veterans believe the results are of questionable value.

Secretary Derwinski says he will not make a final decision on the issue until two more reviews of the scientific literature being prepared for his department are completed this May. But unless that search uncovers compelling evidence that eluded the CDC, most of the veterans seem unlikely to get Government relief from their Viet Nam nightmare.