War costs
revere | September 12, 2008Bush has announced he will reduce the forces in Iraq by 8000 by early 2009. My first thought (after "that's it? I thought we were victorious"; and let's get all of them out now as fast as we can) was to wonder what condition they will be in and what's in store for them in the future? I thought about that particularly because of the emerging scientific literature on strange and rare diseases in Gulf region veterans. One of these diseases is Lou Gehrig's Disease (medical name, amyotrophic lateral sclerosis or ALS). ALS, while rare (about 1 - 2 cases per 100,000 population in the US each year),…
revere | December 5, 2007Most people in the developed world think of measles as a pesky but fairly benign childhood disease. For the current generation, who has had the benefit of immunization with measles vaccine, it is also a historical curiosity. Not so for the developing world, where measles has been a major killer of children and infants. Africa has become the poster child for failed public health programs so it is nice to be able to say that when it comes to measles prevention, Africa is a special success story:
Africa, which has long had the most measles deaths, has seen the biggest drop, 91 percent. In many…
revere | May 7, 2007We've know for some years now that traumatic brain injury (TBI) is the "signature wound" of the Iraq War (see here, here). We know it's true but we don't know its full extent. Nor has the Department of Defense bothered to find out how bad it is, despite the fact that they designed a screening test for TBI "years ago" according to USA Today:
The Pentagon must use computers to screen troops before and after they go to Iraq or Afghanistan to better determine whether they suffered traumatic brain damage in combat, according to a plan by a congressional brain-injury task force.
The Defense…
revere | May 2, 2007The current war in iraq is the second in the last two decades. Gulf War I, in 1991, was over with quickly but still has had lasting health effects for soldiers in theater. Even after 16 years, the exact nature of Gulf War Illness is a controversial subject. For those of us with some knowledge of the range and intensity of environmental exposures -- from dense oil well fire smoke to anti-nerve agent medication to insect repellents to pesticide use to inadvertent exposure to nerve gases -- the question is less whether some of the soldiers are sick but why aren't they all sick. Numerous studies…