Stay safe !
Posted on 09/07/2004 5:20:02 PM PDT by ebersole
I took Larium for four months in Somalia. It gave me red spots, some vivid dreams but no long lasting effects. That was in 93.
Compaired to Malaria, I'm sure I got the better deal.
The only folks I want to see die these days is terrorists.
Which soldier(s) specifically mentioned in the article did not take Lariam?
I'm glad that largest side effect was the dreams. There can also be subtle signs of lariam toxicity such as indigestion, skin rash, tingling in the hands and feet, ringing in the ears, diarrhea and joint pain. Thank you to your sons and their sacrifices. Cheers
Stay safe !
Grasping corpo-rats are as vile as any vermin in the world. I hope the coverup on this fails and the human filth involved gets successfully prosecuted. Using warriors as guinea pigs. Despicable.
However, many substances have a specific side effect only a small segment of the population -- like peanut allergies. Could be that's the case with Lariam, especially since it is well known to have mental/neurological effects. Another possibility is that the combination of Lariam with something else that is now being given to these servicepeople triggers the effect in a certain subset of them -- new vaccines, a certain type of amphetamine prescribed to keep Special Forces guys going through long rigorous missions, or something else along those lines.
Those boys were already diagnosed as mentally disturbed before they started taking the drugs -- that's why they were taking them. Big difference from these Special Forces guys who are put through some of the most rigorous psychological screening on earth before getting into those units.
The military alternative to mefloquine is doxycycline, which has its own can of worms, most seriously that it is given daily vice weekly.
It is interesting that aviators must take doxy; even before this controversy they would be grounded for taking Lariam. The docs considered putting those of us who must retain FAA medicals on doxy, and decided after consulting FAA aeromedical that it would not have an impact on our physicals, as long as we were off the stuff before resuming flying. (My advice to anyone is do not tell your AME you have been on it).
If the guy is not targeting SF then why doesn't he acknowledge that a million Joes and Janes have been on mefloquine for months and years, and apart from the known side effects (particularly the nightmares), most have no problem, and suicide rates are in the normal range?
As far as Vet Centers are concerned... I dunno what yours is like there, but around here they are wall to wall wannabees and phonies, encouraged by lefty shrinks full of Lifton's tendentious drivel. There's one a few miles from my house -- it treats a bunch of bums with war stories they got from the TV in a homeless shelter somewhere. I wouldn't **** on it if it was on fire!
Anyway, the basic reason that the troops on the ground take Lariam is that it is easy to administer. My personal observation in Afghanistan was that in the low country, malaria was widespread among the locals and a common cause of child mortality. Of course they had everything else too: worms, meningitis, TB, bizarre suppurating abscesses; you name it. Other teams encountered cholera and typhus, presumably vectored by returning refugees; we did not. But I would place no stock in CDC statistics from Afghanistan, which has not had any kind of functioning public health system for 25 years, or Iraq, which was isolated for ten.
It's my impression that chloroquine-resistant malaria is becoming the dominant strain. It's not isolated in black Africa any more. (For instance, Indonesia has had cases on Java).
d.o.l.
Criminal Number 18F
Oh, I wouldn't say that. The candidates nowadays must take a Wonderlic test, a Minnesota Multiphasic Personality Inventory, a Test of Adult Basic Education (Level A), and maybe one or two others.
The Wonderlic is an IQ test, full stop: it weeds out the dummies, nothing more. (It is a backup for the GT score (IQ) minumum standard). The MMPI is a personality test that produces several scales indicating where in a range of several personality traits a person finds himself. It is uncannily valid, and can catch people trying to fake the test. So it weeds out some of the quitters, glory seekers and personality disorders (pity they didn't have it when 'Jack' Idema joined up). The TABE just tests basic knowledge: it weeds out the ignorant, the very poorly educated, and those that have learning problems.
When I joined up they didn't have all these tests; instead you had to get a "crazy statement" from the crazy doctor that you were not a nutball. (This is still required for certain types of advanced training today, about which the less said the better). My "crazy doctor" was an AF Pshrink who was absolutely appalled to find himself in the presence of someone who would want to go, in his words, "running off killing snakes and eating people." When I explained that it was eating snakes and killing people, he reluctantly signed the statement for me.
Now, today's regime is certainly more comprehensive than that, and it's more than what other parts of the military do to people who are, mostly, already in the service with good records; but it's far from infallible.
Plus, any psychological test or review is a snapshot of a moment in time. I think most of us can, from our own experience as friends, supervisors, etc., attest to the power of (for instance) a love affair, especially in the throes of starting or ending, to screw up even an orderly and disciplined life.
Right now, malaria prophylaxis is saving American lives. (All the main theaters of the GWOT are in malaria season this very minute). That doesn't mean we can't learn from study, but I want to remind everybody that the decision when the best scientific evidence is in may well be, to take the hits we take from mefloquine psychosis (the literature online says 1 in 15,000 or 20,000 users, which is a VERY high level of such a serious side effect), rather than risk the hits that malaria will give us.
d.o.l.
Criminal Number 18F
One of them, whom I won't name here, found somebody's Size 14 Air Jordans under his marriage bed -- figuratively speaking. Normally an SF guy can dissociate in a situation like that and reason it out to the point that he knows he's going to be laughing with his buddies about it in a year. But not everyone can, all the time.
d.o.l.
Criminal Number 18F
YUCK!!!
I guess I ought to read up more on malaria and its severity. I had it twice before age 5 (living in Rwanda) and don't seem to have suffered any ill effects, so I don't think of it as a big killer -- though I hear it is, at least among the native populations of 3rd World countries who don't have access to high quality medical care.
The weird thing is how the suicides and homicides seem to be heavily concentrated among Special Forces, when 1) lots of other servicepeople are taking this drug (along with other drugs, vaccines, etc.) and 2) they are psychologically screened to a higher level than most other military units. Sure they've got more stressful missions, but that's always been the case, and I don't recall hearing about rashes of suicides or homicides among them in the past.
Was the guy in Lebanon an officer who accidentally shot himself "while cleaning his .45?"
Nope...that was a soldier out of Bragg during the summer of 2002 who accidentally killed himself.
Brandon or Bill?
About 200 million people will sicken with malaria in 2004 and about 2 million of them will die. Most of these victims are young people and children in Africa, but there are a few Americans on the list every year.
d.o.l.
Criminal Number 18F
I'm dating myself, back to 83.
Junior NCO, and it was Browning HP. Nobody had any idea why. What a tragedy, he wasn't even 25, I think.
d.o.l.
Criminal Number 18F
"If the guy is not targeting SF then why doesn't he acknowledge that a million Joes and Janes have been on mefloquine for months and years"
Mark has acknowledged this in many of his previous pieces on the military and Lariam. He also acknowledged this on the CNN segment. If you watched the segment, Paula Zahn wanted to go down the "cover-up" path, but he did not give her what she was looking for. The current suicide rate in Iraq is currently at its lowest point ever and whether or not that is due to the stoppage of mefloquin or implementation of a mental health program, who knows at this point. I'm just damn glad the rate has dropped.
"As far as Vet Centers are concerned"
I should've been more clear in the terminology. The Gulf War Resource Center headed by Steve Robinson has done a significant amount of work on behalf of the veterans in getting many "unexplained" illnesses and the associated problems in front of Congress in order to receive benefits for the soldiers and their families. Lariam toxicity is the latest illness to be recognized by the VA and has awarded the first claim (80%) several weeks ago. This is no small feat considering how long it took the Army to acknowledge the problems associated with the first Gulf War as well as with Vietnam.
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