President of the Vietnam Association of Victims of Agent Orange/Dioxin (VAVA) Nguyen Van Rinh on July 24 visited the Mekong delta province of Hau Giang to inspect the enforcement of policies designed for AO victims.
Hau Giang has 8,400 AO victims, of whom 3,200 had exposed directly to the toxic chemical, according to Thai Vu, Vice President of the provincial Association of AO/Dioxin Victims.
In the first half of this year, the province raised nearly 5 billion VND to buy wheel-chairs, build houses and offer financial assistance to families of AO victims.
In the time to come, it has set to conduct more fund-raising activities that are hoped to aid house building for the victims and scholarships for their offspring, said Vu.
Rinh hailed the province for taking well care for the victims materially and physically.
He showed his support for the locality’s plan to build nursing homes for children with disabilities and contributors to the national revolutionary cause, including AO victims.
On the occasion, the delegation handed over 150 million VND to Hau Giang’s authorities for the construction of five houses for AO victims.
The VAVA was established in 2003 and officially registered as the sole representative entity in coordinating and combining all the possible and varied forms of support activities for AO victims.
It set up a panel to undertake a 2011-2015 study reviewing and making all revisions needed to existing policies for AO victims.
During the war in Vietnam, the US troops sprayed nearly 80 million litres of herbicides, 61 percent of which was Agent Orange containing 366kg of dioxin.
An estimated 4.8 million Vietnamese were exposed to the toxic chemical, with over 3 million of them dying or painfully struggling from its serious effects.
Not only Vietnamese but people from many other countries also became victims of this mass-killing chemical.
VNA
