ROANOKE TIMES
Copyright (c) 1997, Roanoke Times
DATE: Monday, March 10, 1997 TAG: 9703100111
SECTION: NATIONAL/INTERNATIONAL PAGE: A-1 EDITION: METRO
DATELINE: IRVINE, CALIF.
SOURCE: LOS ANGELES TIMES
Washington rejects the theory, but many people say the cause is an infectious microbe.
A number of medical professionals, who say they have become ill while treating Persian Gulf War veterans, claim the mysterious disease afflicting tens of thousands of soldiers is contagious and could pose a public health threat.
Doctors, nurses, laboratory researchers, as well as others who come in casual contact with Gulf War veterans, say they have contracted the same symptoms - fatigue, fever, aches, rashes and respiratory problems - that are generally associated with Gulf War Syndrome.
Government investigators as well as some prominent scientists express deep skepticism about such theories, and they find little evidence to support the claim that Gulf War illnesses are contagious.
But despite the failure to find favor with official Washington and colleagues, many remain convinced that the cause of Gulf War illness is an infectious microbe, either native to the Middle East or produced by Iraq's infamous biological weapon program. Whatever the cause, they say, it is spreading.
As proof, they point to themselves.
``Everyone in this office has had Gulf War illness,'' says Garth Nicolson, an Irvine biochemist at the nonprofit Institute for Molecular Medicine, which he founded to investigate Gulf War Syndrome and other chronic conditions. ``I lost four teeth and had part of my lower jaw removed.''
The inspiration for Nicolson's Irvine institute, which opened to Gulf War veterans last August, was his daughter-in-law, a 101st Airborne Division soldier who became ill after her unit penetrated deep into Iraq during the 1991 conflict.
``Practically everyone in her unit came down with Gulf War illness,'' says Nicolson, who at the time was heading the Tumor Biology Department at the renowned M.D. Anderson Cancer Center in Houston. ``We found out a lot of people in the service were becoming sick, and we'd seen similar illnesses before.''
After a period of intense clinical research and thorough examinations of his daughter-in-law, Nicolson and his biophysicist wife, Nancy, concluded that Gulf War illness could be treated with massive doses of antibiotics.
``She's fully recovered,'' he says of his daughter-in-law. ``She's going to be entering medical school.''
Until recently, many suspected that Gulf War illnesses were caused by chemical weapons. Nicolson and others, however, say chemical weaponry has been a red herring. He argues that the leading culprit may be a bacterium, such as mycoplasma fermentans, which he claims to have found in the blood of 45 percent of the ailing veterans he has tested.
Perhaps genetically altered by the Iraqis or their weapon suppliers, mycoplasma fermentans might have been a biological warfare agent used in warheads that exploded above allied troop positions during the Persian Gulf conflict, Nicolson contends. Or it may have been dispersed in some other way by the Iraqis.
In its final report two months ago, the Presidential Advisory Committee on Gulf War Veterans' Illnesses discounted Nicolson's arguments about the likely source of Gulf War Syndrome.
``Clinical evidence seems to indicate that mycoplasma is not a source of widespread illness in Gulf War veterans,'' says Mark Brown, a senior policy analyst on the committee, which will continue to oversee Pentagon investigations into Gulf War illness.
``What clinical evidence?'' Nicolson asks. ``They've never presented any clinical evidence that mycoplasma wasn't involved, because all signs and symptoms of Gulf War illness can be caused by mycoplasmal infections.''
Despite the committee's findings, doctors at the Walter Reed Army Medical Center near Washington, D.C., recently agreed to work with Nicolson.
``A protocol for evaluating Dr. Nicolson's work is being developed now,'' says Walter Reed spokesman Ben Smith. ``Everybody involved with Gulf War illness, all the folks here at Walter Reed and elsewhere, have said we'll look at anything that'll help patients.''
And the Senate Veterans' Affairs Committee, after hearing testimony from many worried veterans, has vowed to investigate.
LENGTH: Medium: 82 linesby CNB