Parasite may be killing veterans

HERALD, West Virginia - A half century after serving in Vietnam, hundreds of veterans have a new reason to believe they may be dying from a silent killer.

Test results show that some of the men may have been infected by a parasite while fighting in the jungles of Southeast Asia.

The Department of Veterans Affairs this spring commissioned a small pilot study to look into the link between liver flukes ingested through raw or undercooked fish and a rare bile duct cancer. It can take decades for symptoms to appear. By then, patients are often in tremendous pain, with just a few months to live.