Source: http://www.honoluluadvertiser.com/article/20090817/NEWS01/908170340/0/NEWS01/Aid-sought-for–Atomic-Vets-
Posted on: Monday, August 17, 2009
Aid sought for ‘Atomic Vets’
Bill would facilitate care for U.S. veterans exposed to radiation
By John Yaukey
Advertiser Washington Bureau
WASHINGTON – Charles Clark knew something was wrong when he started losing his teeth at age 37.
“They just fell out – no blood,” the Hawai’i resident said.
He is virtually certain it had something to do with his Navy service in the Pacific during World War II, when he was exposed to atomic bomb radiation.
On Sept. 23, 1945, the 17-year-old sailor entered Nagasaki, Japan, where six weeks earlier the world’s second nuclear weapons attack had killed 80,000 people. Some died due to massive doses of radiation.
Clark remained in Nagasaki for five days, setting up ship-to-shore communications. It would forever change his life.
Since then, “I’ve had more than 180 skin cancers removed from my face,” he said in a recent interview. “Even today, the cancer keeps recurring. It never stops.”
Clark is among a group called the “Atomic Vets” – American military veterans exposed to radiation from nuclear weapons.
Between 1945 and 1962, half a million U.S. troops participated in more than 250 atmospheric and underwater atomic bomb tests, most in the Pacific and Nevada. Many of these veterans have since suffered a panoply of illnesses commonly associated with radiation exposure, but many have had trouble getting the care they need.
Rep. Neil Abercrombie, D-Hawai’i, has introduced legislation that would streamline the process and add transparency.
“These veterans are dying every day from diseases caused, at least in part, by their service in atomic tests and other nuclear weapon-related activities,” the 11-term congressman said.
The treatment process is run through the Department of Veterans Affairs using data from the Defense Threat Reduction Agency.
Typically, the process entails a veteran approaching the VA with a claim. At that point, the agency sends the information to the DTRA, which decides whether the veteran’s service record indicates past exposure to high doses of radiation.
This process, known as “dose reconstruction,” can take months and occurs behind closed doors, critics say.
It can be cumbersome and mysterious, especially for someone already dealing with a life-threatening illness.
The DTRA and the VA recognize 22 types of cancer that qualify as caused by radiation exposure. Some cancers must occur within a particular time frame, such as 20 years from exposure, to qualify.
More than 90 percent of the veterans who apply for benefits outside the set parameters are denied, according to research Abercrombie’s staff has done.
Abercrombie’s legislation, the Atomic Veterans Relief Act, would add transparency by opening up DTRA’s analysis methods.
There is no companion bill yet in the Senate. Abercrombie introduced his legislation around Memorial Day. He hopes it will pick up momentum as stories like Clark’s circulate, and as lawmakers gain appreciation for the sacrifices of war through the prism of two ongoing conflicts.
“We’re trying to get some certainty in the process,” said Abercrombie, who is running for governor in a state with a large retired military population.
DTRA spokeswoman Kate Hooten said the agency has well-established protocols for determining radiation exposure, and she noted that over the decades, many veterans have scattered across the globe and are out of touch with government health care networks.
“This is an important issue,” she said. “We’re always interested in finding out how we can reach out to the public.”
Vets remember
To make the case for his reform legislation, Abercrombie has collected the narratives of some veterans who worked around nuclear tests and are suffering multiple cancers and other ailments.
Edward Blas, who lives on Guam, was stationed in the Marshall Islands during the cleanup on Eniwetok Atoll after 43 nuclear tests there.
“The evidence was overwhelming that we were exposed to high levels of ionizing radiation while we lived on ground zero,” he wrote.
Despite the fact that he has never smoked, Blas is anemic and diabetic and weighs half the 220 pounds he did in the service. But his medical claim was denied on the grounds that veterans who served there after the nuclear tests were not considered “atomic vets.”
But those were different times. Not much was known about radiation exposure.
In the early days of the nation’s nuclear program, Cold War imperatives overrode most other concerns.
“I’ve talked to people who were pretty casual about radiation in the early going,” said Richard Rhodes, author of the 900-page Pulitzer Prize-winning book “The Making of the Atomic Bomb.”
“We were at war and we had to take some risks,” Rhodes said in an interview this week.
For Clark, the risks went further than his own body.
His daughter lost both breasts, while his granddaughter suffers from skin ailments, all of which he is convinced can be traced back to Nagasaki.
“We just never understood what we were getting into back then,” Clark said. “We were young kids.”
February 25, 2010
Dear Sir,
My father was first exposed to the atomic bomb when they were doing the testing in New Mexico. Dad was not yet in the army and was living at home in New Mexico. He said that a big cloud came over their home and ithe sky was clear every where else. He said that his mother instructed him and his siblings to get into the house. The next morning all of the chickens and sheep were dead. Dad was then drafted into the regular army in 1946-47 and did his training at a military base in the area where they were still testing the atomic bomb. Thus being exposed a second time. My father was then expose again for the third time when they sent him over to Nakasoki Japan to clean up after the atomic bomb had been dropped. He claims the ground was black like charcoil and that the air smelled like sulfar. Upon coming home my father married and was a farmer until well into his 60’s and then his health began to deteriate.
Dad had develped diabetes and had a heart condition. In his mid 70’s he lost part of his leg just below the knee related to his diabetes. Shortly after dad began to get worse and developed Alhzheimers Desease. He died at age 79 in his sleep at the VA Hospital in the Alzheimers Ward.
Someone once told my dad, as he was trying to get the government to admit that he was an atomic vet, that the exposure to the radiation could affect his children and his grandchildren. I beleive it has. In 2006 my brother died from a 1 year struggle with a rare cancer. He had tumors all through his body in his muscles. Only 1% of all cancer victims develop this type of cancer and they did not know how to treat it. It was long and painful with many treatments of radiation and chemo, he was 56. This same brother’s son was born in 1976 with his fingers fully formed but webbed together on both hands. His 3rd son born in 2007 had at the same birth defect. I also beleive that I may have been born with some birth disorders. Since I was a teenager I had complained of pain in my upper stomach, just below my ribs. At age 48 after many test it was determined through an x-ray that my stomach has flipped over and was resting on my liver. Through extensive surgery the abnormaty was corrected. The surgeon said my stomach had been that way for some time and had to be tacked to the inside wall to keep it from flipping back over. At 50 I had a colonoscopy and after many attempts to clean the colon out the surgeon was then able to view the inside of my colon. It was then determined that I had an unusual amount of colon in which 18 inches were then removed from my colon in another extensive surgery. (During this time and during the death of my brother my husband was deployed for 22 months, 6 months in Mississippi and then 16 months in Iraq.) I have 5 grown children and of those all three of my sons where hard and induced labors, in which after 2 of those births the placenta would not release from my uterus. I also had 3 second term pregnancies of which were healthy normal babies. (One of these pregnancies also would not release the uterus.) My youngest brother has developed a mild form of Parkinson’s. And just last year my 18 year old daughter had a hernia repaired. The hernia went up instead of the usual development which most always go down. The surgeon said that only 1% of the entire World has this kind of hernia and that she had never seen one before. At the present time my 22 year old daughter is suffering from some kind of intestinal infections or desease and she has been hospitalized with it and has gone through many test and yet nothing has been determined of the cause. She is scheduled for more test next week. She is weak and has constant diahrreia.
Maybe this is all a coincedence, but maybe it isn’t. If it is then my family has paid the price extensively. Especially my dear mother. It would be nice if the government would take ownership of what they did to our nations soldiers. And to also compensate my mother and other veterians and/or widow(ers). This being for all the suffering that my mom has had to go through on the behave of my father and us his/her siblings. Don’t you think?
Thank you for taking the time to read this very long email. I greatly appreciated it.
Sincerely yours,
Kitie (Parish) Hollenbeck on behave of James Melton Parish(Army Retired & deceased}
February 25, 2010
Dear Sir,
My father was first exposed to the atomic bomb when they were doing the testing in New Mexico. Dad was not yet in the army and was living at home in New Mexico. He said that a big cloud came over their home and i
the sky was clear every where else. He said that his mother instructed him and his siblings to get into the house. The next morning all of the chickens and sheep were dead. Dad was then drafted into the regular army in 1946-47 and did his training at a military base in the area where they were still testing the atomic bomb. Thus being exposed a second time. My father was then expose again for the third time when they sent him over to Nakasoki Japan to clean up after the atomic bomb had been dropped. He claims the ground was black like charcoil and that the air smelled like sulfar. Upon coming home my father married and was a farmer until well into his 60’s and then his health began to deteriate.
Dad had develped diabetes and had a heart condition. In his mid 70’s he lost part of his leg just below the knee related to his diabetes. Shortly after dad began to get worse and developed Alhzheimers Desease. He died at age 79 in his sleep at the VA Hospital in the Alzheimers Ward.
Someone once told my dad, as he was trying to get the government to admit that he was an atomic vet, that the exposure to the radiation could affect his children and his grandchildren. I beleive it has. In 2006 my brother died from a 1 year struggle with a rare cancer. He had tumors all through his body in his muscles. Only 1% of all cancer victims develop this type of cancer and they did not know how to treat it. It was long and painful with many treatments of radiation and chemo, he was 56. This same brother’s son was born in 1976 with his fingers fully formed but webbed together on both hands. His 3rd son born in 2007 had at the same birth defect. I also beleive that I may have been born with some birth disorders. Since I was a teenager I had complained of pain in my upper stomach, just below my ribs. At age 48 after many test it was determined through an x-ray that my stomach has flipped over and was resting on my liver. Through extensive surgery the abnormaty was corrected. The surgeon said my stomach had been that way for some time and had to be tacked to the inside wall to keep it from flipping back over. At 50 I had a colonoscopy and after many attempts to clean the colon out the surgeon was then able to view the inside of my colon. It was then determined that I had an unusual amount of colon in which 18 inches were then removed from my colon in another extensive surgery. (During this time and during the death of my brother my husband was deployed for 22 months, 6 months in Mississippi and then 16 months in Iraq.) I have 5 grown children and of those all three of my sons where hard and induced labors, in which after 2 of those births the placenta would not release from my uterus. I also had 3 second term pregnancies of which were healthy normal babies. (One of these pregnancies also would not release the uterus.) My youngest brother has developed a mild form of Parkinson’s. And just last year my 18 year old daughter had a hernia repaired. The hernia went up instead of the usual development which most always go down. The surgeon said that only 1% of the entire World has this kind of hernia and that she had never seen one before. At the present time my 22 year old daughter is suffering from some kind of intestinal infections or desease and she has been hospitalized with it and has gone through many test and yet nothing has been determined of the cause. She is scheduled for more test next week. She is weak and has constant diahrreia.
Maybe this is all a coincedence, but maybe it isn’t. If it is then my family has paid the price extensively. Especially my dear mother. It would be nice if the government would take ownership of what they did to our nations soldiers. And to also compensate my mother and other veterians and/or widow(ers). This being for all the suffering that my mom has had to go through on the behave of my father and us his/her siblings. Don’t you think?
Thank you for taking the time to read this very long email. I greatly appreciated it.
Sincerely yours,
Kitie (Parish) Hollenbeck on behave of James Melton Parish(Army Retired & deceased}
Aloha Kitie
Thank you for sharing your testimony about how your family was affected by atomic bombs. I am sorry that you and your family have had to endure so much suffering. You are right to demand that the government take responsibility for the harm it has caused your family. Even if it cannot be medically proven that your family’s health problems were directly caused by exposure to the atomic blasts and the health problems, the government should take responsibility on the principle that exposing your father to such a hazard was wrong. The government should provide medical treatment and compensation on the principle that their neglect could have been the cause of the health problems. In Hawai’i we have many Marshall Islanders who come for treatment of medical conditions caused by exposure to the 67 atomic and nuclear tests conducted in their islands. Again the government is trying to deny responsibility and liability for the medical condition and treatment of this group. I hope for justice for you and your family. Take care.
Sincerely, Kyle Kajihiro
I am an Atomic Veteran and participated in Operation Hardtack in 1958.
I was in the Air Force as a communications equipment service technician stationed on Fred Island (Eniwetok Atoll) . I was with the 1253rd AACS. I was also stationed on Johnston Island for Project Newsreel. That was the aerial shot that shook up all of Hawaii and us too.
I have written a small book with the title, “Where the Boys Were.” It is a collection of facts and stories from other Atomic Veterans who, like me, are seeking recognition and justice from their government after 52 years of waiting. All we ask is what other countries have done for their surviving Atomic Veterans, including Japan. We receive nothing but lip service from our own Congress. I would like others to read this material and hopefully add many voices to our cause. I will send the .pdf file to anyone who requests it.
I have placed the entire contents on some websites.
In addition to the military men who proudly served, let us not forget the thousands of civilians who were members of the construction crews that helped make the nuclear test missions possible. They too, deserve recognition for they received the same amount of ionizing radiation as the military.
The Marshall Islands played a pivotal role in the Atomic testing Programs and the Marshallese received massive doses of radiation because of the tests in their homeland. Our government admitted responsibility for injuries to the Marshallese and compiled a list of 46 assumptive diseases caused by radiation exposure. By comparison, only 22 ionizing radiation diseases are on the Atomic Veteran’s list.
One wonders how the Marshallese who were exposed to the same levels of radiation or less are in greater danger than the military personnel and American civilians who were not protected to a higher degree than the island residents.
Therefore, it is only right and just that the country they served recognize those who participated in the Atomic Tests of 1958, compensated, and treated by the VA for illnesses caused by ionizing radiation.
It is my fervent hope that in raising awareness about the plight of thousands of Atomic Veterans who served their county, we can create sufficient critical mass and form a charitable fund to provide medical assistance and compensation to the surviving Atomic Veterans, and a medal to recognize and honor all who served, now living and deceased.
I am searching for more Atomic Veteran’s so I may add their stories to the book. My ultimate goal is to obtain one hundred unique stories and then get the completed edition in the hands of influential people like Oprah, Colin Powell, Bill O’Reilly and all of the Congress. I want to be the catalyst for creating sufficient awareness so we can gain recognition for this class of forgotten veteran.