Uranium blamed for Gulf War Syndrome (BBC)

["Sandy Perle" <sandyfl@earthlink.net>]

Tuesday, February 2, 1999 Published at 23:00 GMT - BBC

Uranium blamed for Gulf War Syndrome  

Exploding missiles tipped with uranium exposed servicemen to the 
toxic metal  

Sixteen British Gulf War veterans say they have proof they are 
suffering from radiation poisoning, caused by materials in the 
weapons used by the Allies.  

The men believe this could be a factor in Gulf War Syndrome, the 
condition which thousands of soldiers say they developed after 
serving in the region.  

In Iraq, doctors also say children have been deformed by the same 
radiation.  

Shaun Rusling served in the Gulf War and today, he takes a dozen 
different drugs to treat a catalogue of illnesses, from chronic fatigue 
and post-traumatic stress disorder to problems with the nervous 
system and depression.  

Doctors have diagnosed him as suffering from Gulf War Syndrome.  

The Ministry of Defence says the syndrome as such does not 
exist, so Mr Rusling and two of his fellow Gulf veterans, Mike 
Kirkby and Mike Burrows, have been desperately seeking reasons 
for the illnesses since their return from the war zone.  

They say independent tests carried out in Canada revealing they 
and 13 other veterans have uranium radiation poisoning may at last 
provide some answers.  

Mr Rusling says: "Basically we have just been diagnosed with a 
bone disease...that is where depleted uranium finishes - in your 
bones.  

"I'm saddened by our treatment by the Ministry of Defence because 
we went out to do our job.  

"I treated Iraqi casualties with more care and compassion than this 
government has treated me," he adds.  

Mr Rusling believes it was while serving with a field hospital unit 
that he was exposed to depleted uranium in dust form.  

A by-product of weapons grade uranium, which in most forms is 
perfectly safe to handle, depleted uranium was used by British and 
American forces on the tips of missiles to devastating effect.  

Controversially, the veterans say they ingested tiny particles of the 
toxic metal after the missiles burned up in the atmosphere.  

Mr Kirkby says: "They were blowing locations up and we were 
driving through bodies and blown -up tanks. You were breathing all 
the smoke and the dust off the sand."  

In Iraq, there is no shortage of tragic stories about families whose 
children have a wide range of birth deformities.  

Professor Selma Al-Tah, a paediatrician in Baghdad, believes her 
studies demonstrate a link with depleted uranium and the many 
terrible genetic defects.  

"A lot of cases are really monsters. Some of them have no necks, 
their appearance or their facial appearance is completely 
distorted", she says.  

No matter how many examples there are of terrible deformities or 
leukemia, Iraq's hospitals are so badly off that proving a link with 
depleted uranium will be difficult, if not impossible, without the 
proper resources.  

But the fact that similar cases have also been identified among the 
families of British and American soldiers who served during the Gulf 
War, is regarded as too much of a coincidence.  

The Ministry of Defence's medical team is highly sceptical about 
these latest reports.  

However, a spokesman said it would be happy to study any new 
tests which may shed light on the many and varied conditions 
affecting Gulf War veterans.  

On Tuesday, families of veterans also criticised a government 
report, released last week, which said Gulf War Syndrome did not 
exist in the form of one condition.  

The report, by doctors working in the Ministry of Defence's Medical 
Assessment Programme and released last Thursday, said soldiers 
who fought in the 1991 war had developed illnesses, but no single 
psychological or physiological cause was found.  

The National Gulf Veterans and Families Association said the 
report was "an outrageous attempt to cover up Gulf War illness". 

Sandy Perle
E-Mail: sandyfl@earthlink.net 
Personal Website: http://www.geocities.com/capecanaveral/1205

"The object of opening the mind, as of opening 
the mouth, is to close it again on something solid"
              - G. K. Chesterton -
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