Illnesses of Gulf War Veterans Debated : Health: Lawmakers chide the government for contending there is no link between ailments and exposure to toxic chemicals.

Members of a House panel expressed concern Wednesday that the government has been too quick to dismiss the health complaints by veterans of the Persian Gulf War.

In a packed hearing room, Rep. Joseph Kennedy (D-Mass.) lambasted government health officials who contended there is no link between an assortment of reported ailments and any exposure that service personnel may have had to toxic chemicals during the conflict.

But in testimony before the House Veterans Affairs subcommittee on hospitals and health care, Brig. Gen. Ronald Blanck of the Army’s Office of the Surgeon General said many of the complaints could be attributed to “common medical problems or appear to be stress-related.”

Since their return from the Gulf, many veterans have reported chronic fatigue, heart trouble, skin irritation and hair loss--symptoms they fear stem from the deployment to the region. Speculation about the source of such illnesses has ranged from petrochemical contamination caused by exposure to raging oil-well fires to diseases spread by Saudi Arabian sand flies.

“To date,” Blanck said, reading from an Aug. 20 Pentagon report, “there is no objective evidence that a single soldier, sailor, airman or Marine has an illness that can be linked with petroleum exposure from his Persian Gulf experience.”

He added: “These guys have real illnesses. So far, we are unable to relate it conclusively to environmental exposure. . . . The military position has always been that we don’t know” if there is a link between Gulf veterans’ illnesses and toxic chemicals.

A civilian advisory panel convened by the Army reviewed six cases last month and concluded there was no evidence that any of the illnesses could be linked to exposure to petrochemicals.

Rep. Lane Evans (D-Ill.) criticized the makeup of the panel, which included a representative of the petroleum industry, and questioned the objectivity of the report, noting it was overseen by the military.

“Simply to write (the illnesses) off as stress-related is a rushed judgment we want to avoid,” Evans said.

Kennedy said he had received complaints from people who went to Veterans Administration hospitals to report such symptoms as hair loss and bleeding gums and were referred to psychiatrists.

All of those who believe their disorders may be related to chemical contaminants will be treated at veterans hospitals, said Anthony Principi, deputy secretary of the Department of Veterans’ Affairs.

Bristling from years of criticism that it ignored Vietnam veterans’ complaints of illness linked to their exposure to the chemical defoliant Agent Orange, the Pentagon wants to set up an extensive system to track Gulf War veterans.