Gulf War Illnesses: DOD's Conclusions about U.S. Troops' Exposure Cannot Be Adequately Supported
GAO-04-159
Published: Jun 01, 2004. Publicly Released: Jun 01, 2004.
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Highlights
Since the end of the Gulf War in 1991, many of the approximately 700,000 U.S. veterans have experienced undiagnosed illnesses. They attribute these illnesses to exposure to chemical warfare (CW) agents in plumes--clouds released from bombing of Iraqi sites. But in 2000, the Department of Defense (DOD) estimated that of the 700,000 veterans, 101,752 troops were potentially exposed. GAO was asked to evaluate the validity of DOD, Department of Veterans Affairs (VA), and British Ministry of Defense (MOD) conclusions about troops' exposure.
Recommendations
Recommendations for Executive Action
| Agency Affected | Recommendation | Status |
|---|---|---|
| Department of Veterans Affairs | The Secretary of Defense and the Secretary of Veterans Affairs should not use the plume-modeling data for future epidemiological studies of the 1991 Gulf War, since VA and DOD cannot know from the flawed plume modeling who was and who was not exposed. |
In commenting on a draft of this report, VA agreed with the recommendation, but noted that it had already completed studies that incorporated the DOD plume model as part of the parameters. Given our assessment, it is important that VA inform the researchers to include appropriate caveats. VA remains in concurrence with the recommendation, but again pointed out that it had completed studies that incorporated the DOD plume model.
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| Department of Defense | The Secretary of Defense and the Secretary of Veterans Affairs should not use the plume-modeling data for future epidemiological studies of the 1991 Gulf War, since VA and DOD cannot know from the flawed plume modeling who was and who was not exposed. |
In commenting on a draft of this report, DOD did not concur with the recommendation. We subsequently clarified the wording of the recommendation to address its concerns. In commenting on the final report, DOD stated that it stands behind the modeling that it did and continues to nonconcur with the recommendation. DOD stated that scientific experts in modeling reviewed both the methodology and results of the modeling and concluded that the DOD work was sound. DOD stated that GAO has ignored scientific fundamentals in its analysis and only evaluated historical models. Thus, any assessments of modeling made by GAO should only be considered as applicable to historical models. It further stated that GAO?s insistence on the value of the Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory modeling was a serious error. It claimed that based on an independent analysis, the Institute for Defense Analyses judged this model to be less capable than other DOD models. In addition, DOD claimed that GAO underestimated the abilities of epidemiologists using the DOD data. The population identified as potentially at risk has been used by various researchers, and, according to DOD, they clearly understand the assumptions made in modeling and the considerations necessary to evaluate the health of this population in comparison to controls. DOD stated that those published studies are appropriately valid.
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| Department of Defense | The Secretary of Defense should require no further plume modeling of Khamisiyah and the other sites bombed during the 1991 Gulf War in order to determine troops' exposure. Given the uncertainties in the source term and meteorological data, additional modeling of the various sites bombed would likely result in additional cost while still not providing DOD with any definitive data on who was or was not exposed. |
DOD concurred with this recommendation.
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Topics
Chemical agentsChemical exposureChemical warfareData collectionData integrityGulf war syndromeHealth hazardsHealth statisticsMilitary personnelStatistical dataVeteransIraq War (1991)