Seven weeks after his induction into the Army in 1966, Dr. Jeffrey L. Brown was sent to Vietnam, where he spent a year treating front-line soldiers, sometimes under fire. He knew next to nothing about weapons when he went, but returned a battlefield doctor. Back home, he got married, started a family and opened a pediatric practice. Decades later, Dr. Brown, now 72, developed ailments which, he thought, seemed “consistent with his age.” So he was surprised to learn not long ago — from reading a newspaper article — that at least one of those ailments, ischemic heart disease, has been linked to exposure to the defoliant Agent Orange, which was used widely in Vietnam. It...
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