A depressing thread

[Dinner]

http://www.vva.org/veteran/1207/agent_orange_feature.html

Don't take my word for it, read what the VA has to say about it.

[Kuciwalker]

It speaks volumes about Chiang's ability to achieve his goals. If he couldn't defend his capital I seriously doubt he could have made significant headway in things that would facilitate development.

He could have not starved tens of millions of people to death.

[Aeson]

The fact that Uncle Sam has a federal pork program is not evidence for said pork program's validity.

And your evidence that it's just pork is ... ?

Darwin has a challenge for you and reg. 2-4-D is readily available from most gardening supply stores. It was one of the components of Agent Orange. It is sometimes contaminated with dioxins (TCDD and DCDD). Are you going to:

a) drink it (we aren't herbs after all!)
b) leave an empty bottle of it under your bed for a few months
c) spray it without using protective gear including a chemical filter on your mask
d) none of the above (eg. not act like idiots)

Spoiler:

One study found that occupational exposure to 2,4-D caused male reproductive problems, including dead and malformed sperm.

(Plenty of other problems with exposure to it, but this is the one that fits the Darwin challenge most adequately.)

[Aeson]

The fact that Uncle Sam has a federal pork program is not evidence for said pork program's validity.

And your evidence that it's just pork is ... ?

Darwin has a challenge for you and reg. 2-4-D is readily available from most gardening supply stores. It was one of the components of Agent Orange. It is sometimes contaminated with dioxins (TCDD and DCDD). Are you going to:

a) drink it (we aren't herbs after all!)
b) leave an empty bottle of it under your bed for a few months
c) spray it without using protective gear including a chemical filter on your mask
d) none of the above (eg. not act like idiots)

Spoiler:

One study found that occupational exposure to 2,4-D caused male reproductive problems, including dead and malformed sperm.

(Plenty of other problems with exposure to it, but this is the one that fits the Darwin challenge most adequately.)

[Kuciwalker]

Spoiler:

One study found that occupational exposure to 2,4-D caused male reproductive problems, including dead and malformed sperm.

I looked up that study and although I can't see the body, based on the abstract it is very unlikely that he should be convinced by that study.

We studied the reproductive function of 32 male farm sprayers who were exposed to 2,4-D. Sperm analysis was made after 4 days of sexual inactivity. Parameters analyzed were volume, sperm count, mobility and morphology. Exposure level was estimated by measuring the concentration of 2,4-D in the urine. Significant levels of asthenospermia, necrospermia and teratospermia were found in exposed workers compared with unexposed controls. Over time, asthenospermia and necrospermia diminished but the abnormal spermatozoa (teratospermia) continued.

[Aeson]

You seem to be much more enthusiastic and thorough about delving into the details of other guy's sperm than I was

(Plenty of other problems associated to 2-4-D exposure. That one was just good for the Darwin reference. If you want to take the challenge feel free )

[kentonio]

Can someone explain to me where this teen right wing fantasy about agent orange and GWS being myths has come from? Because there's always some really stupid and/or wildly offensive opinions spewed out at this site, but this one takes the biscuit. May we assume that this is a Beck/Limbaugh talking point?

[Krill]

At least, nothing to see related to Agent Orange.

Those birth defects are allegedly caused by dioxin, which is only found in trace quantities in Agent Orange. Dioxin breaks down in direct sunlight. Ordinary soil contains way more dioxin than Agent Orange.

It's pretty goddamn easy for the Vietnamese government to whip up a bunch of kids with crazy birth defects in a country with nearly 90 million people and then assign a convenient boogeyman to them for international sympathy.

http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC2754980/

That contaminant was also found at Seveso, which is much more highly documented and researched.

And guess what? TCDD causes cancer.

[Kuciwalker]

Dude, I actually read that damn study. Out of the something like 150+ variables they looked at, they only reported a few as being significant at 95% (and 'borderline' at that).

In many of the cases where they note a pattern of increased risk, there were extremely few cases. For example:

Among respiratory cancers a three-fold significant increase was seen for pleural cancer, particularly among males (three cases; RR, 3.89; 95% CI, 1.19-12.7).

The slightly increased risk for breast cancer in zone A females became significant after 15 years since the accident, based on five cases.

Oh boy, I'm sure convinced

[Krill]

Read this one as well?

Agent Orange Exposure, Vietnam War Veterans, and the Risk of Prostate Cancer
Author(s): Chamie, K (Chamie, Karim)1,2; White, RWD (White, Ralph W. deVere)1; Lee, D (Lee, Dennis)1; Ok, JH (Ok, Joon-Ha)1,2; Ellison, LM (Ellison, Lars M.)1,2,3
Source: CANCER Volume: 113 Issue: 9 Pages: 2464-2470 DOI: 10.1002/cncr.23695 Published: NOV 1 2008
Times Cited: 20 (from Web of Science)
Cited References: 29 [ view related records ] Citation Map
Abstract: BACKGROUND. it has been demonstrated that Agent Orange exposure increases the risk of developing several soft tissue malignancies. Federally funded studies, now nearly a decade old, indicated that there was only a weak association between exposure and the subsequent development of prostate cancer. Because Vietnam War veterans are now entering their 60s, the authors reexamined this association by measuring the relative risk of prostate cancer among a cohort of men who were stratified as either exposed or unexposed to Agent Orange between the years 1962 and 1971 and who were followed during (lie interval between 1998 and 2006.

METHODS. All Vietnam War era veterans who receive their care in the Northern California Veteran Affairs Health System were stratified as either exposed (n = 6214) or unexposed (n = 6930) to Agent Orange. Strata-specific incidence rates of prostine cancer (International Classification of Diseases, 9th Revision code 185.0) were calculated. Differences in patient and disease characteristics (age, race, stocking history, family history, body mass index, finasteride exposure, prebiopsy prostate-specific antigen (PSA) level, clinical and pathologic stage, and Gleason score) were assessed with chi-square tests, t tests, a Cox proportional hazards model, and multivariate logistic regression.

RESULTS. Twice as many exposed men were identified with prostate cancer (239 vs 124 unexposed men, respectively; odds ratio [OR], 2.19; 95% confidence interval [95% CI], 1.75-2.75). This increased risk also was observed in a Cox proportional hazards model front the time of exposure to diagnosis (hazards ration 2.87; 95% CI, 2.31-3.57). The mean time from exposure to diagnosis was 407 months. Agent Orange-exposed men were diagnosed at a younger age (59.7 years: 95% CI, 58.9-60.5 years) compared With Unexposed men (62.2 years: 95% CI, 60.8-63.6 years), had a 2-fold increase in tire proportion of Gleason scores 8 through 10 (21.8%; 951% CI, 16.5%-27%) compared with unexposed men (10.5%; 95% CI. 5%,-15.9%), and were more likely to have metastatic disease at presentation than men who were not exposed (13.4%; 95% CI, 9%-17.7%) than unexposed men (4%; 95% CI, 0.5%-7.5%). In univariate analysis, distribution by race, smoking history, body mass index, finasteride exposure, clinical stage, and mean prebiopsy PSA were not statistically different. In a multivariate logistic regression model, Agent Orange was the most important predictor not only of developing prostate cancer but also of high-grade and metastatic disease oil presentation.

CONCLUSIONS. Individuals who were exposed to Agent Orange had an increased incidence of prostate cancer; developed the disease at a younger age, and had a more aggressive variant than their unexposed counterparts. Consideration Should be made to classify, this group of individuals as 'high risk,' just like men of African-American heritage and Inert with a family history of prostate cancer. Cancer 2008; 113:2464-70. (C) 2008 American Cancer Society.

Cancer [0008-543X] Chamie, Karim yr:2008 vol:113 iss:9 pg:2464 -2470

Still, probably less unhealthy than coke, right?

[kentonio]

Dude, I actually read that damn study.

Did you? Oh gee, that must mean that you know more than all the doctors who say there are huge widespread health effects then, given that you went to Yale and all.

[Kuciwalker]

edit: xpost

Obviously not, since you hadn't posted it yet. What you just posted contains no details about how they actually classified people as exposed or unexposed and whether there could be confounding factors (they covered the basics, but I would expect exposure correlates strongly with other environmental factors peculiar to service in Vietnam).

In addition, I take a default position of "assume it is worthless crap" about any individual medical study, because

1) I have observed that the people who work in these fields frequently suck at experimental design and have only the barest glimmerings of understanding of statistical methods ("well you just do this thingy in SPSS").

2) It has recently become the vogue to perform metastudies to examine the reproducibility of studies in various fields, and to my knowledge these consistently show something like half of all published articles in medicine as being unreproducible.

[Kuciwalker]

Did you? Oh gee, that must mean that you know more than all the doctors who say there are huge widespread health effects then, given that you went to Yale and all.

Jaguar's the one who went to Yale, I went to Carnegie Mellon. And, yes, my education actually does make me more qualified to judge the proper application of statistical methods than a large fraction of medical researchers.

[kentonio]

Jaguar's the one who went to Yale, I went to Carnegie Mellon. And, yes, my education actually does make me more qualified to judge the proper application of statistical methods than a large fraction of medical researchers.

..and of course the VA hand out literally billions of dollars for pretend illnesses because the government just loves giving away free money, right?

[Kuciwalker]

Yes, but source on the billions please.