Community | September 26, 2009 | 4 comments

Marines Get Breast Cancer from Poisoned Water

source: http://www.cnn.com/2009/HEALTH/09/25/marines.breast.cancer.folo/index.html?iref=mpstoryview

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TAMPA, Florida (CNN) -- For Rick Kelly, the first sign of cancer was a feeling of discomfort in his chest.

"My wife would hug me, and it became almost unbearable," he said. "I went to a doctor, and they sent me to the oncologist, and they did biopsies on both sides. And then I ended up with a double mastectomy."

Kelly is one of 20 retired U.S. Marines or sons of Marines who once lived at Camp Lejeune, North Carolina, and who are now suffering from breast cancer, a disease that strikes about one man for every 100 women who get it. Each of the seven men CNN interviewed for this report has had part of his chest removed as part of his treatment, along with chemotherapy, radiation or both.

All 20 fear that water contaminated with high levels of toxic chemicals may have caused their illnesses, but the Marine Corps says no link has been found between the contamination and their diseases. Without that link, the men are denied treatment by the Department of Veterans Affairs, which says it can't treat them for a condition that hasn't been shown to have been "service-related."

The men with breast cancer are among about 1,600 retired Marines and Camp Lejeune residents who have filed claims against the federal government. According to congressional investigators, they are seeking nearly $34 billion in compensation for health problems they say stemmed from drinking water at the base that was contaminated with several toxic chemicals, including some the federal government has classified as known or potential cancer-causing agents.

Jerry Ensminger is a former Marine Corps drill instructor who was stationed at the base in 1976, when his daughter, Janey, was born. She died of childhood leukemia at age 9.

"We were being exposed when we went bowling," Ensminger told CNN. "We were being exposed when we went to the commissary. We were being exposed when we went to the PX. And then when we went home, we were being exposed over there."

In 1981, the lab again found "water highly contaminated" -- and added the word "solvents," with an exclamation point. In August 1982, the experts found one sample with levels of trichloroethylene, a degreaser believed to cause cancer, of 1,400 parts per billion. Today's EPA safe level for the substance is five parts per billion.

"Nobody in this world has been more disillusioned than I've been. I feel like I've been betrayed."

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4 comments // Marines Get Breast Cancer from Poisoned Water

  • Gravity_Man
    • 0
      Gravity_Man  

    • Once you sign on the dotted line to give your life for the country you've entered No Man's Land where civilian lawyers cant help ya. They'll not win any $34,000,000 not even for the little girl died of leukemia. Chances are she died from vaccines given her anyway, vaccines stuffed with poison buffers called "adjuvants".

      Although it's likely the adjuvants were magnified from the Camp LeJeune poisoned drinking water. She must have been very strong to survive both the poison water and the vaccines til she was 9YO. Very sad, but there are millions of young people besides her who died early from leukemia.

      These many immigrants flooding through America's borders, thinking they're entering the Land flowing with Milk and Honey, are going to be in for a surprise. We make more new chemicals here than any place else in the world plus new medicines, and they're all combining together underneath us in the ground water table.

      And the nation's water filtration systems aren't doing it. As it stands right now folks we're not following the dinosaurs, we're blasting past them. The words mass dieoff and extinction come to mind. We're doing ourselves in nearly as fast as any killer asteroid. Doomsday is here we're looking it in the eye.

    • 2 years ago
  • Atalanda_Cameron
  • MotherForTruth
  • regjoeschmo
    • 0
      regjoeschmo  

    • Amazing that something so rare can happen in an Army base camp, but it has nothing to do with the environment they were living in..... How much do you wanna bet they were subjects of an experiment that was unkown even to them?? Wouldnt be the first time our military has done this to our soldiers......

    • 2 years ago
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