Word: toxication
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Vietnam veterans won another skirmish last week in the battle over Agent Orange, but the government continues to hold its ground. For 14 years now, veterans' groups have charged that the herbicide used to defoliate the jungle canopy was toxic to soldiers. More than 35,000 have filed claims for diseases like cancer and birth defects in their children. Last week the Department of Veterans Affairs announced that a limited number of vets who contracted peripheral neuropathy, a nervous disease that causes numbness and tingling, within 10 years of their service will be allowed disability payments...
...cartel has also buried cocaine in toxic chemicals. In 1989 Customs agents and New York policemen found almost 5,000 kg of the drug inside 252 drums of powdered lye. No sane inspector would poke around in lye, which can inflict severe eye, skin and lung burns. Luckily, someone had tipped off the authorities...
...Clouseaus begin looking everywhere for a culprit. Dan Quayle raises questions about the ancient plumbing at the Naval Observatory -- the official 100-year-old vice-presidential residence, which the Bushes occupied for eight years. Suspicion spreads to other sources of presidential water, which are tested for the presence of toxic levels of iodine or lithium...
...testimony, much of it bitter, went this month before the Senate environment and public-works subcommittee on toxic substances. Dallas petroleum consultant Tom Latimer, 36, testified that he used the widely sold insecticide diazinon six years ago to control grubs eating grass roots at the same time that he was taking the drug Tagamet to control warts. Neither chemical came with a warning of dangerous interaction, but the impact of diazinon, an organophosphate that inhibits nerve action, was apparently magnified by the Tagamet. Today his eyesight remains severely damaged; he has constant headaches; his memory, concentration and mental acuity...
Disney's image has also suffered from several unpleasant illegalities. Last year it was fined $550,000 by the Environmental Protection Agency for sewage violations and for improperly storing toxic waste on its property. The company made headlines in 1989 when -- in an effort to stop vultures from pecking out the eyes of tortoises on Discovery Island -- Disney employees apparently trapped and beat some of the scavengers to death. Federal and state officials charged the company that animated Bambi with 16 counts of animal cruelty. Disney agreed to give $95,000 to local conservation groups; the charges were dropped...