ST. LOUIS, MO (KTVI)– A plan to track sick soldiers is picking up speed. Congressman Todd Akin wants to create a registry of all U.S. soldiers who think they’ve been sickened by burn pits.
FOX 2 first exposed this toxic military practice two years ago. It used to be common for the military to burn landfill waste — right on military bases in Iraq and Afghanistan. Veterans have described to me us that even years after returning home from the war, they can still taste the black smoke that hung over them. We know from Congressional testimony that the military burned everything including plastics, body parts, computers and nuclear waste.
Congressman Akin proposes tracking veteran illnesses related to burn pits, but Akin told us the Department of Defense repeatedly says burn pits are not hazardous. In our recent FOX Files report, we revealed a declassified military memo admitting the health hazard. Congressman Akin believes it’s really a no-brainer. He believes a health registry is hard to be against.
Todd Akin (R) – Missouri said, “We’re simply saying let’s get the information, let’s simply record, because it appears just on superficial evidence that there are a lot of incidents of lymphoma that seem to be connected with the burn pits.”
The legislation is called the ‘Open Burn Pit Registry Act.’ Today it passed the Veterans Committee and now heads to the House.
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