Veterans told gulf illness still a mystery

By Daniel Perez

El Paso Times

January 22, 1999

Army veteran Richard Kusserow remembers the scene as if it were yesterday. His medical supplies unit had to get an anthrax shot while serving in Operation Desert Storm in 1991.

The serum was taken out of bottles labeled: "Experimental. Not for human consumption."

"We joked that our babies would have horns and hoofs," he said.

Today the West Side resident suffers from many of the symptoms commonly reported by Persian Gulf war veterans: short-term memory loss, joint pain and fatigue.

Thursday he was among the 150 people who sat through a gulf war illness town hall meeting at Fort Bliss' Soldier Hall. Kusserow appreciated the opportunity to express his concerns.

The meeting ended the three-day visit by members of the Office of the Special Assistant to the Deputy Secretary of Defense for Gulf War Illness. The goal was to inform active-duty military, veterans and their families of what has been learned about the illness, what medical services are available to them, and what technological and tactical advancements have been made so it doesn't happen again.

"We've ruled out some things, but we've found no true reasons for the undiagnosed illnesses," Bernard Rostker, under secretary of the Army, said at the meeting.

Rostker was joined on the panel by Navy Capt. Michael Kilpatrick, office director of medical issues, and Stephen R. Shapiro, chief of staff of the Department of Veterans Affairs Health Care Center in El Paso. They listened to audience questions, comments and stories for more than 90 minutes.

Officials had promised that the Department of Defense was ready to do what it must to answer the needs of people stricken by gulf war illnesses.  Rostker told the audience that the government has spent more than $150 million to research the problem.

"We've been on this a while and will press forward," he said.

About 3,000 people are on the gulf war illness registries maintained by Beaumont Army Medical Center and the El Paso Veterans Affairs Health Care Center. About 10,000 military personnel from the El Paso region were deployed to the gulf war in 1991. Nationwide, about 700,000 served in the conflict and about 108,000 are on the gulf war registries due to health complaints or concerns. About 160,000 military personnel who served in Desert Storm are still on active duty.

How many more need to be registered and examined is unknown, said Everett Ray Perdue, special assistant to the director of the VA health center. He hoped that the three-day visit by the Washington experts shined a light on the problem and would get other gulf war veterans to register.

"(Medical) research continues," he said. "There's evidence something more can be done."

One skeptic in the audience said that he's still not convinced there is such a thing as gulf war illness.

Dr. Paul Wehrle, a retired Army doctor who now is in private practice, said he's examined more than 100 soldiers at Fort Campbell, Ky., who claimed to have the illness.

He considered their problems as common medical maladies elevated by post-traumatic stress syndrome.

Before the meeting, Rostker said there would always be skeptics and those who think there's more to the story that the government isn't releasing.

"The fact is we're here. The fact is we want to share everything. There is no cover-up," he said.

He admitted that communication and initial military reports were faulty but that his office continues the investigation, which includes talking to gulf war veterans at such meetings.

Investigators are most suspicious of the detonation of an Iraqi ammunition dump near the southern part of the country. About 100,000 U.S. soldiers may have been exposed to low-level release of chemicals during a three-day period.

Several theories have been offered for gulf war illness, including exposures to pesticides, chemical warfare agents, biological warfare agents, vaccines, pyridostigmine bromide tablets, infectious diseases, depleted uranium, smoke from oil well fires, petroleum products, and stress.

Rostker assured active-duty Fort Bliss soldiers that there was no standing chemical or biological problem in the Middle East where they are deployed.  Post units have been on a steady rotation to the Middle East since the gulf war.

"The biggest health hazard there is blowing sand," he said.

The special gulf war illness office was set up two years ago. Office members have made monthly stops at military installations since last April. It's next stop is in February in Fort Polk, La. The group plans additional monthly stops at military installations through September.

(Printed in El Paso Times Jan. 22, 1999)