Sick Veterans Deserve Better

One in seven of the 700,000 military personnel who served in the Persian Gulf War a decade ago has been stricken by a mysterious set of chronic symptoms, including fatigue, joint pain, digestive troubles and poor memory. The suffering could be relieved at least partly by a concerted federal effort to improve research and treatment of the so-called Gulf War syndrome. Yet a report released last week by the Institute of Medicine shows that Pentagon officials have failed to implement key reforms recommended in five studies--namely improvements in medical monitoring of environmental hazards in battle theaters.

Some epidemiologists suspect that Gulf War syndrome is caused by an interaction of genetic factors and exposure to environmental toxins like low-level radioactivity, pollution from oil well fires and poison gas. However, the Pentagon, after spending $155 million studying illness in Gulf War veterans, has found no links between their ailments and environmental toxins and no evidence to justify grouping the illnesses together as a single “syndrome.”

At a heated hearing last week, Senate leaders urged Pentagon and Department of Veterans Affairs officials to promptly take two sensible and long-overdue steps:

* Fund more independent research. Senate leaders rightly suggested that Pentagon officials may have a conflict of interest in funding studies that might one day show they failed to adequately protect the health of their troops.

The Pentagon can prove its neutrality by funding studies by outside researchers like Robert Haley, a respected epidemiologist at the University of Texas who last month infuriated the Pentagon by publicly suggesting that exposure to low levels of nerve gas and pesticides, in combination with an anti-nerve gas drug, might have contributed to brain damage found in some Gulf War veterans.

* Ensure that all Gulf War veterans are treated regardless of whether they can prove that their symptoms are service-related. The VA says it provides health benefits to all Gulf War veterans, but at the hearing legislators produced evidence to suggest that some legitimate claims could be denied.

Military delays in implementing reforms are increasingly dangerous because traditional bulwarks like armor are powerless to deter today’s deadliest biological weapons. The growth of these “poor man’s atomic bombs” has made medical readiness more essential than ever to military readiness.