THE VIRGINIAN-PILOT
Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: Tuesday, August 15, 1995 TAG: 9508150257
SECTION: FRONT PAGE: A1 EDITION: FINAL
SOURCE: FROM WIRE REPORTS
DATELINE: WASHINGTON LENGTH: Medium: 99 lines
Hillary Rodham Clinton urged a presidential commission on Monday to tackle every angle in investigating why thousands of veterans of the Persian Gulf War returned with various illnesses - even as a panel of independent medical experts said the Pentagon was too hasty in concluding that there was no evidence of a ``Gulf War syndrome.''
``No issue is off-limits, and every reasonable inquiry should be pursued,'' Hillary Clinton told the first meeting of the President's Advisory Committee on Gulf War Veterans' Illnesses.
President Clinton formed the commission to evaluate the undiagnosed illnesses that have afflicted many who served in the Persian Gulf during military operations in late 1990 and early 1991. The commission is to send Clinton its report by Dec. 31, 1996.
Symptoms have included chronic fatigue, memory loss, rashes, respiratory problems, insomnia, gastrointestinal problems and recurrent infections.
Some veterans have suggested that such ailments were the result of conditions in the battlefields of Desert Storm, the U.S. campaign. These conditions included chemical pollutants from burning oil fields, garbage dumps and insecticides. The troops also received inoculations to protect against germ warfare, and they endured weeks of living in the desert, amid blowing sand and biting insects.
Hillary Clinton has taken an interest in the issue since she received complaints from veterans during her work on health care last year, and the commission invited her to speak.
Addressing the group Monday, she said that ``thousands of veterans who were healthy when they left for the Gulf War are now ill.'' She added: ``Based on the research to date, however, experts have concluded that there is not enough evidence to call this a syndrome.''
Even before Hillary Clinton spoke, the Institute of Medicine issued a report saying the Defense Department had not adequately explained its conclusion that the illnesses did not constitute a definable syndrome unique to Persian Gulf War veterans.
The institute is a not-for-profit research group affiliated with the National Academy of Sciences.
The Institute of Medicine report said the Pentagon had ``made conscientious efforts'' to evaluate the health of 10,020 American veterans of the Gulf War who complained of unusual illnesses. But the report went on to say that the Pentagon had failed to support its preliminary conclusion that there was no single syndrome but rather a variety of illnesses.
Moreover, the report said, it appears likely that some patients ``have developed illnesses that are directly related to their Persian Gulf service,'' including psychological stress and infectious diseases that are rare outside the Middle East.
The Institute of Medicine report said the Pentagon's study did not adequately discuss such possible links between the veterans' health problems and their service in the gulf.
Earlier this month, the Pentagon issued a report saying it found ``no clinical evidence for a new or unique illness or syndrome among Persian Gulf veterans.''
Many who served, and their families, disagree.
Jeanette Martinez, the widow of a veteran who died of a brain tumor three years after returning from the Persian Gulf, is pessimistic about the presidential committee's role in the wake of the Pentagon report.
``I think it's like everything else. They're just covering it up,'' said Martinez, president of the Persian Gulf Veterans of America, a nonprofit organization in San Antonio, Texas. ``I had a husband who passed away from the syndrome with a very malignant brain tumor.
``He didn't leave with it. He came back with it. The tumor was half the size of his head, and they're going to tell me there was nothing there that could cause something like that?'' she said. ``It's a silent holocaust. That's what they're trying to cover up.''
The Clinton administration, however, claims it is trying to solve this medical mystery.
In his remarks to the presidential commission, Deputy Defense Secretary John P. White said the Pentagon was continuing its scientific investigation of the illness and ``doing all we can to get to the bottom of this.''
Secretary of Veterans Affairs Jesse Brown noted that it took the government 20 years to conclude that Agent Orange, a defoliant used by American forces in Vietnam, caused a variety of illness among soldiers who served there. He said it must not take that long to find the causes and treatments for the ailments afflicting Persian Gulf veterans.
Brown told the advisory panel that the administration is taking aggressive action to understand and treat the unusual ailments among the veterans.
``We should view Gulf War illnesses in the same way we view a gunshot wound to the head or to the chest,'' he said. ``They are just as serious, just as devastating.''
Nearly 700,000 service members served in the Gulf War. More than 75,000 have filed disability claims, but only 19,300 of those claims have been approved, according to reports. ILLUSTRATION: Color Photo
``Every reasonable inquiry should be pursued,'' Hillary Rodham
Clinton told a presidential panel Monday.
KEYWORDS: PERSIAN GULF WAR VETERAN GULF WAR SYNDROME by CNB