The third boy was only slightly wounded. During the Vietnam War, U.S. planes dropped tons of cluster bombs on Laos. The boy is an orphan whose mother died in childbirth. His father was killed in 1994 when a buried grenade exploded under a cooking fire. Most bombie victims are poor farmers or their children.
Families often have to borrow money from relatives or sell their land to pay.
Barbara Lewis, a physician's assistant from the United States, administers the war victims fund. Although the bombies and grenades that litter Laos are similar to landmines in that they kill and wound long after war's end, types of injuries tend to be different, says Lewis. Bombie victims often sustain upper body injuries rather than losing limbs, which is more usual in mine accidents. In Laos many people live in the dense mountains, far from medical facilities. Lewis recalls one accident victim took a week to get to a hospital.