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DoD, VA Study Finds Lou Gehrig's Disease in Gulf War Vets
Friday, December 21, 2001
By Rudi Williams
American Forces Press Service

VA is moving so fast because veterans who have contracted the disease can't wait for the peer review process to be completed, VA Secretary Anthony J. Principi said. "They need help now, and we'll offer it to them," he said.

WASHINGTON -- AFIS
A large epidemiological study conducted by the departments of Defense and Veterans Affairs found preliminary evidence that Persian Gulf War veterans are nearly twice as likely as their non-deployed counterparts to develop Lou Gehrig's disease.

The disease, amyotrophic (am-ee-o-trow-phic) lateral sclerosis, or ALS, is often called Lou Gehrig's disease because the baseball star died from it. It's a fatal neurological disease that destroys the nerve cells that control muscle movement. Scientists don't know what causes ALS, and there is no cure for it.

DoD provided the lion's share of the money for the $1.3 million jointly funded study, which began in March 2000. The investigation involved nearly 700,000 service members who served in Southwest Asia during operations Desert Shield and Desert Storm during the period Aug. 2, 1990 and July 31, 1991. More than 1.8 million service members who did not deploy to the Persian Gulf were also interviewed.

"We found 40 cases of Lou Gehrig's disease among veterans who served in the Gulf area -- almost twice as many compared to those who didn't serve in the gulf," said VA Secretary Anthony J. Principi. About half of the 40 veterans have died.
(More: DefenseLINK.Mil News Source)
2001 © American Forces Press Service.

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