PROTECTING THE HEALTH OF DEPLOYED FORCES: LESSONS LEARNED FROM THE PERSIAN GULF WAR Printed for the use of the Committee on Government Reform Available via the World Wide Web: http://www.gpo.gov/congress/house 89-544 PDF U.S. GOVERNMENT PRINTING OFFICE WASHINGTON: 2003 For sale by the Superintendent of Documents, U.S. Government Printing Office COMMITTEE ON GOVERNMENT REFORM DAN BURTON, Indiana TOM DAVIS, Virginia, Chairman CHRISTOPHER SHAYS, Connecticut RON LEWIS, Kentucky JO ANN DAVIS, Virginia TODD RUSSELL PLATTS, Pennsylvania ADAM H. PUTNAM, Florida JOHN J. DUNCAN, JR., Tennessee CANDICE S. MILLER, Michigan WILLIAM J. JANKLOW, South Dakota HENRY A. WAXMAN, California JOHN F. TIERNEY, Massachusetts DIANE E. WATSON, California STEPHEN F. LYNCH, Massachusetts CHRIS VAN HOLLEN, Maryland LINDA T. SANCHEZ, California C.A. "DUTCH" RUPPERSBERGER, Maryland ELEANOR HOLMES NORTON, District of Columbia JIM COOPER, Tennessee CHRIS BELL, Texas BERNARD SANDERS, Vermont (Independent) Moxley, Dr. John H., III, managing director, North American Health Care Division, Korn/Ferry International; Dr. Manning Feinleib, profes- sor of epidemiology, Bloomberg School of Public Health, Johns Hopkins University; and Steven Robinson, executive director, National Gulf War Winkenwerder, William, Jr., M.D., M.B.A., Assistant Secretary of Defense for Health Affairs, Department of Defense, accompanied by Michael E. Kilpatrick, Deputy Director for the Deployment Health Support Directorate, Department of Defense; Robert H. Roswell, M.D., Under Secretary for Health, Department of Veterans Affairs, accompanied by K. Craig Hyams, Chief Consultant, Occupational and Environmental Health, Department of Veterans Affairs Letters, statements, etc., submitted for the record by: Burton, Hon. Dan, a Representative in Congress from the State of Indi- Feinleib, Dr. Manning, professor of epidemiology, Bloomberg School of Letters dated November 27, 2002 and February 27, 2003 Maloney, Hon. Carolyn B., a Representative in Congress from the State 130 97 7 Pages from "Saddam's Bombmaker," Moxley, Dr. John H., III, managing director, North American Health Robinson, Steven, executive director, National Gulf War Resource Center, Roswell, Robert H., M.D., Under Secretary for Health, Department of 26 53 18 HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES, SUBCOMMITTEE ON NATIONAL SECURITY, EMERGING Washington, DC. The subcommittee met, pursuant to notice, at 2 p.m., in room 2247, Rayburn House Office Building, Hon. Christopher Shays (chairman of the subcommittee) presiding. Present: Representatives Shays, Turner, Lewis, Murphy, Janklow, Kucinich, Maloney, Bell and Tierney. Staff present: Lawrence Halloran, staff director and counsel; Thomas Costa and Kristine McElroy, professional staff members; Robert A. Briggs, clerk, Joe McGowen, detailee; David Rapallo, minority counsel; and Jean Gosa, minority assistant clerk. Mr. SHAYS. I would like to call this hearing to order, this hearing entitled, "Protecting the Health of Deployed Forces: Lessons Learned from the Persian Gulf War." When the war in Iraq is over, we will mourn our dead, and a grateful Nation will welcome home legions of battle-tested men and women who fought for freedom in a far-off place. Some will be well. Some will be wounded. We may not always be able to tell the difference. Not all the casualties of modern warfare are apparent. Injuries and illnesses linked to exposures to chemicals, pathogens, and toxins may not manifest symptoms until months or years after the victory parades. But those wounded are as much our responsibility to prevent or treat as those caused by bullets and bombs on the battlefield. Today we ask if the health of deployed forces is being effectively monitored and adequately protected against the insidious but often avoidable perils of their very hazardous workplace. Gulf war operations in 1991 could have taught us much about the dose-response relationship between wartime exposures and delayed health effects, but essential health data was never recorded. The Department of Defense [DOD], took years to acknowledge obvious deficiencies in Gulf war-era health protections for deployed forces. Since 1997, the Pentagon has issued impressive volumes of directives and joint staff policies on improved medical recordkeeping, battlefield environmental monitoring, troop location data, and health surveillance before, during and after deployments. Ex |