Mike Partain: The Relentless Voice for Camp Lejeune and the Forgotten Veterans

Mike Partain, 57, has lived his adult life at the intersection of science, suffering, and advocacy. Born at Camp Lejeune Marine Corps Base in North Carolina in 1968, he was among the hundreds of thousands of infants conceived, carried, and delivered in an environment later proven to be saturated with toxic chemicals—
trichloroethylene, perchloroethylene, benzene, and vinyl chloride. Decades later, at just 39, Partain was diagnosed with male breast cancer—a disease so rare that it affects fewer than 0.05 percent of men without hereditary risk factors. With no family history and negative BRCA 1 and 2 tests, he began asking the same question that still drives his mission today: what poisoned us—and why did it take so long to tell the truth?

Camp Lejeune: A Betrayal in the Water
Between 1953 and 1987, the drinking-water supply at Camp Lejeune was heavily contaminated with carcinogenic solvents that leaked from underground fuel tanks and industrial waste sites. Internal Marine Corps documents later revealed that base officials were alerted to the contamination but downplayed the risk. “From 1980 to 1987, the Marine Corps knowingly poisoned their own people,” Partain has testified. An estimated one million Marines, their families, and civilian workers were exposed.

What began as a health mystery became a lifetime crusade. In 1997, public-health assessments quietly acknowledged contamination; by 2012, after years of grassroots pressure, limited VA healthcare was finally extended to affected families. A full decade later, in 2022, Congress passed legislation allowing victims to sue the federal government. Yet progress has been agonizingly slow. “There are more than 410,000 claims filed,” Partain explains. “In three years, the government has settled about 830. Justice is being delayed as our community dies off from age and cancer.”

Always Faithful—and Still Fighting
Partain’s story was chronicled in the Emmy-nominated documentary Semper Fi: Always Faithful, where his collaboration with fellow Marine Jerry Ensminger exposed the government’s failure to act. A historian by training and a former teacher by profession, Partain turned his research skills into weapons of accountability. He compiled a 50-page, document-linked timeline on The Few, The Proud, The Forgotten—a database that became the evidentiary backbone for congressional hearings. Twice he has testified before Congress, and twice he has walked the halls of the White House pressing for scientific integrity and survivor rights. “We fought this scientifically,” he says. “Facts and documents were the only way anyone listened. It wasn’t emotion that changed policy—it was proof.”

2025- A Second Battle: The PACT Act Rollback
Now Partain is confronting a new and equally troubling chapter. The PACT Act—landmark legislation intended to expand healthcare and compensation for veterans exposed to toxins during military service—initially recognized male breast cancer as a presumptive condition linked to chemical exposure. Recently, however, the Department of Veterans Affairs quietly rescinded that presumption.

“The VA is playing gender politics,” Partain warns. “They’re claiming that male breast tissue isn’t reproductive, so male breast cancer doesn’t qualify. Science doesn’t back that. Male and female breast tissue share the same structure. The only difference is hormones.” To him, the rollback is “an opening salvo in reducing veterans’ benefits”—a bureaucratic maneuver that abandons men who served, from Vietnam through the Gulf War, all of whom encountered many of the same toxins that devastated Camp Lejeune.

Connecting the Dots: From Toxins to Health Crises
Partain’s own life underscores the long tail of exposure. Even as a child he suffered liver problems—common among Lejeune families. His advocacy now expands beyond cancer to the full spectrum of toxic-related illness: bladder and kidney cancers, leukemias, non-Hodgkin’s lymphoma, Parkinson’s disease, and neurological disorders. He often calls male breast cancer “the canary in the coal mine”—a rare and alarming sign of environmental breakdown that foreshadows broader public-health disaster. “If we accept cancer as a way of life,” he says, “then we’ve lost our future.”

Building Alliances and Gathering Data
Today Partain collaborates with scientists, physicians, and advocacy groups to advance non-invasive diagnostic research. He recently partnered with Dr. Robert L. Bard, a diagnostic-imaging specialist and medical advisor to the Male Breast Cancer Global Alliance (MBCGA). Together they are exploring advanced ultrasound and OligoScan technologies that measure heavy-metal and neurotoxin residues within body tissue—data that could help connect environmental exposure to physiological damage long after blood tests show “normal.”

For Partain, that kind of evidence could reshape the national conversation. “If we can document ongoing contamination in living tissue, we can prove what exposure really does,” he insists. “The government responds to data, not pain.”

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Reflections on the PACT Act and the Duty to Protect Our Own The PACT Act—formally known as the Promise to Address Comprehensive Toxics Act—was enacted as a long-overdue recognition of the invisible injuries endured by those who served. It expands healthcare and benefits for veterans exposed to toxic substances such as Agent Orange, radiation, and the notorious burn pits used in recent conflicts. Most importantly, it establishes more than twenty new presumptive conditions—which means that veterans no longer have to bear the impossible burden of proving that their illness was caused by military service. For anyone who has fought a war only to later battle for recognition of their suffering, this law represents a measure of long-denied justice. It also introduces mandatory toxic exposure screenings for all enrolled veterans, ensuring that the VA can identify health issues earlier and connect individuals with vital resources. Having served as a U.S. Army field physician in Thailand during the Vietnam era, I personally witnessed the widespread use of herbicides like Agent Orange and the resulting environmental devastation. Few could comprehend at the time that these exposures would linger for generations—silently seeding cancers, endocrine disorders, and neurological diseases among our own ranks. The soldiers who returned home were told little about what they had been breathing or touching. Many developed strange symptoms decades later, only to be dismissed or left to navigate a bureaucratic maze. For those of us who saw these chemicals used firsthand, the eventual acknowledgment through the PACT Act felt like an affirmation that our nation had finally chosen to confront its own complicity in toxic harm. Laws like the PACT Act are not merely policy; they are moral obligations. Our service members entrust their bodies and futures to the government they defend. When they are injured by exposures—whether to Agent Orange in Vietnam or burn pits in Iraq and Afghanistan—it is unconscionable to deny them the care they have earned. Burn pits, often filled with plastics, metals, and medical waste, created toxic clouds that enveloped bases for years. Many soldiers returned with respiratory illnesses, autoimmune diseases, and rare cancers linked to these inhaled poisons. To hear of any rollback or resistance to the PACT Act today is unconscionable. It betrays the very principles of duty and honor that define military service. Our responsibility to those who served does not end when the war is over—it begins the moment they return home, still fighting unseen battles within their own bodies. Dr. Robert L. Bard, MD, DABR, FAIUM, FASLMS BardDiagnostics / MBCScan.org

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Grassroots without the Noise
Over 18 years of advocacy, Partain has learned that movements survive on credibility. “We never took donations, never incorporated,” he explains. “Our integrity was everything.” He is wary of self-styled saviors and splinter groups that exploit tragedy for attention. “There have been hijackers who twist the story. We fought not just the Marine Corps, but misinformation inside our own ranks. The only thing that ever worked was truth, verified by documents.”

His network today includes survivors’ families, attorneys, and medical experts. Through his Camp Lejeune Toxic Water Survivors group—20,000 members strong on social media—he continues to collect testimonies, organize information, and connect victims with legal and medical resources. “This isn’t just about the Marines,” he reminds audiences. “It’s about their wives, their children, and even grandchildren who carry genetic and epigenetic burdens from these toxins.”

Legislation in Limbo
Partain is equally vocal about stalled legislation. Two bills—one in the House, one in the Senate—aim to accelerate Camp Lejeune claim settlements and strengthen government accountability. “Right now, they’re stuck in committee,” he says, referencing Judiciary Chair Jim Jordan in the House and Senators Mike Lee and Dan Sullivan in the Senate. “Without public pressure, these bills will die there. We need outrage to move Congress.”

He quotes one federal judge who joked grimly that “this litigation will outlast the Roman Empire.” To Partain, that remark captures the federal government’s foot-dragging. “Every month of delay means more funerals,” he says. “Justice deferred is justice denied.”

Beyond Camp Lejeune: A National Exposure Crisis
While his roots are in Lejeune, Partain now sees a national pattern: toxic exposures at Kelly Air Force Base, Pease Air Force Base, and Fort Hood, among others, have left similar health legacies. He has begun collaborating with Rosie Torres, founder of Burn Pits 360, to unite domestic and foreign exposure communities. Their shared goal: a single framework that recognizes chemical and environmental injury—no matter where service occurred. “The burn-pit fight opened the door,” Partain says. “Now we must walk through it for every American base.”

The Advocate’s Creed
Despite his candor, Partain speaks with restraint born of experience. “We’re fighting an institution built on honor and integrity. You can’t just yell; you have to out-prove them.” His weapon remains research. His fuel is outrage tempered by purpose. “Complaining is one part,” he says. “Doing something about it is the second.”

He calls on physicians, veterans, and citizens alike to re-frame the narrative. “Stop talking just about cancer—talk about exposure. Exposure is the root. Cancer is the symptom.”

A Legacy of Accountability
Eighteen years after his diagnosis, Mike Partain remains cancer-free. Yet his fight continues—for himself, for his children, and for the thousands who never got their day in court. “This isn’t about revenge,” he says softly. “It’s about recognition. The government owes its people the truth.”

From congressional halls to grassroots forums, his message never wavers: Honor begins with accountability. And until every poisoned Marine, spouse, and child is heard, Mike Partain will keep changing the wallpaper—seizing each moment, and making sure it leads to change.