Urgent Message to Friends of Gulf War Illness Research
Excerpts of the Chairman’s message to the Senate
Friends of Gulf War illness treatments research:
"I was stunned to learn that the Senate Appropriations defense subcommittee report on the 2010 defense appropriations bill includes no dedicated funding for the Gulf War illness research program of the Congressionally Directed Medical Research Program.
I implore your help to preserve this essential program to identify treatments to restore the health of 175,000 ill Gulf War veterans and to protect current and future servicemembers at risk of similar exposures."
"The Congressionally-mandated Research Advisory Committee report released in November unanimously concluded that Gulf War illness is real, was caused by wartime toxic exposures, and affects one in four of those who served. A major Department of Veterans Affairs study published in April confirmed this figure. There are currently no effective treatments.
The report identified treatment research as the highest research priority and endorsed the CDMRP program. In its first two years of existence, with a total of $15 million, the program has funded nine treatment studies, now underway, compared to three in the entire previous history of federal GWI research. It focuses on small pilot studies of promising treatments already approved for other diseases and is open to all researchers on a competitive basis. "
"The defense appropriations subcommittee report lumps Gulf War illness with 27 other diseases in a $50 million package for illnesses that generally have no special connection to military service.
It is grounded in the erroneous assumption that “this is VA’s problem,” which ignores the facts that DoD has historically provided the majority of GWI research, that VA can only fund VA researchers and thus cannot engage the vast majority of the scientific community, that current and future servicemembers remain at risk. "
"The subcommittee report approach would fundamentally end the program through minimal funding and the loss of dedicated program support. The termination of the only significant federal GWI treatment research program would be devastating to the hopes of Gulf War veterans for better health."
Sincerely,
James Binns
Chairman, Research Advisory Committee on Gulf War Veterans Illnesses
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