The world according to Monsanto : pollution, corruption, and

62 the world according to monsantodeadly effects of dioxin on human health. He had been consulted by a sixtythree-year-oldman in the Norrlands University Hospital at Umea University.Suffering from liver and pancreatic cancer, he had been a forest workerin northern Sweden who for more than twenty years had been employedspraying a mixture of 2,4-D and 2,4,5-T on deciduous trees. Thus began along research process in collaboration with three other Swedish scientiststhat led to the publication of studies pointing to the association betweensoft-tissue sarcoma and dioxin exposure. 33In 1984, Hardell was asked to testify before an investigative commissionthat had been set up by the Australian government, which was then facingdemands for reparations from soldiers who had participated in the VietnamWar alongside the Americans. The Royal Commission on the Use and Effectsof Chemical Agents on Australian Personnel in Vietnam presented itsreport in 1985, and it provoked sharp controversy. 34 In an article in AustralianSociety, Professor Brian Martin of the University of Wollongong denouncedthe manipulations that had led the commission to “acquit AgentOrange.” 35 Indeed, in a display of staggering optimism, the report found, accordingto Martin, that “no veteran had suffered due to exposure to chemicalsin Vietnam.” The commission concluded: “This is good news and it isthe commission’s fervent hope that it will be shouted from the rooftops.”In his article, Martin recounted that the expert witnesses called by theVietnam Veterans Association had been “attacked strongly by counsel forMonsanto Australia.” Martin went on to say: “The commission’s report evaluatedthe expert witnesses in similar terms to Monsanto. Those who did notrule out the possibility of the chemicals having harmful effects had their scientificcontributions denigrated and their reputations belittled. By contrast,expert witnesses exonerating the chemicals were uniformly lauded by thecommission.” The authors of the report did not hesitate to copy almost verbatimtwo hundred pages provided by Monsanto to denigrate the results ofthe studies by Hardell and Olav Axelson. 36 “The effect of the copying is topresent the views of the Monsanto submission as the commission’s own,”Martin observed. For example, in the vital volume dealing with the carcinogeniceffects of 2,4-D and 2,4,5-T, “the Monsanto submission’s phrase ‘it issubmitted that’ has been replaced in the commission’s report by the phrase,‘the commission concludes,’ in the midst of pages and pages of almost verbatimcopying.”Very sharply challenged by the report, which insinuated that he had ma-