Malaria drug links elite soldier suicides

UPI ^ | 9/7/04 | Dan Olmsted, Mark Benjamin

[ebersole]

Unfortunately, I only know information moving forward from 97...

[nightdriver]

One thing the military is completely mule-headed about is the drugs they make the soldiers, sailors, etc. take.

They don't give a rip if it causes instant death, they will cover up, defend, obfuscate, or whatever it takes to keep from having to answer for the deleterious effects of their drigs.

[nightdriver]

drigs = drugs. (sheeesh!)

[Criminal Number 18F]

The soldier in Lebanon was a long time ago -- 1983. He was not from Ft Bragg but from 10th SFG(A) which was in those days at Ft. Devens.

The guy with the marital problems was not either of the ones you mention (or should I say all three? As there are two Bills) but actually came home early to try to straighten out the marital difficulties. He took the wrong approach. Although I believe that one of the names you listed also maps to long-time marital stress.

Now, there is another case that gets tossed in with these and definitely shouldn't be. There was a 10th Group soldier that capped himself after returning from Iraq -- shortly after being arrested for trying to set up a tryst with a 13 year old. In that case, suicide was probably the best thing for that sick soul. That man was not either of the ones you have named (and I don't believe he was an SF soldier, rather a support guy... who are no better than the average run of support guys and occasionally you get a bummer. In 10th in 1979 we had two guys murder one of 'em's wife and we had "Green Beret Killer" headlines for three years... they were a cook and a truck driver, IIRC).

If you really want to know who had an Air Jordans problem, freepmail me. This stuff is tragic enough without washing it out in public.

And finally: to anyone who reads this --- if it's that bad, divorce her (or him!). You'll be able to laugh about it soon enough. Suicide is pleasing only to Allah, I mean Satan (I'm always getting those two confused. Must be the mefloquine!)

d.o.l.

Criminal Number 18F

[Axenolith]

Whoa, that's pretty whacked.

What were the effects, if you don't mind my asking? It sounds like Malaria is preferable...

[Porterville]

Paranoia without realizing you are paranoid... and you can sense the moods and vibes within a city due to the hypersensitivity (without realizing it)... it is like feeling by the tips of your hair.... also freaky dreams

[MonaMars]

"I have to say, I have my doubts about this. Thousands of us took Mefloquine (Lariam), once a week, for months on end, and while there were some side effects -- most of the guys had extremely vivid nightmares -- "

Vivid nightmares are an indication that a drug IS having an effect on the brain, mild though it may be. From what I understand, those guys who had the severe reactions to Larium subsequently had tests that showed brain stem damage. Specifically, they had SPECT scans and, I believe, evoked nystagmus tests. You only flunk both those tests if you have something bad going on in your brain. You certainly don't exhibit nystagmus, especially persistent upbeating nystagmus, or have an abnormal SPECT from garden variety psychological issues. It's organic in nature. And the psych problems are secondary to the organic problem, not the other way around. Also, there's no way to predict who'll get those particular side effects from Larium. In other words, the guys who are a little 'off' aren't necessarily the ones who'll have problems. It seems to be completely random. I'm sure Larium helps zillions more than it hurts, but woe to the one in a thousand. I, for one, am glad that the potential side effects are getting publicized, however rare they may be. Forewarned is forearmed.

[7.62 x 51mm]

It was the "are all believed..." part that I have a problem with.

[ebersole]

All of the specific soldiers mentioned in the article were confirmed to have taken Lariam. I don't believe he meant all of the US soldiers in theatre in Iraq and Afghanistan, but then again if he did mean all soldiers in the middle east, then he is wrong.

[E. Pluribus Unum]

Those boys were already diagnosed as mentally disturbed before they started taking the drugs...

Most boys are diagnosed by the public schools as something or other these days - that way they can drug 'em and forget 'em.

[Criminal Number 18F]

Thanks for this information, MM.

I presume that the SPECT scan and nystagmus test were prescribed by a physician concerned about some other behavioural issue or complaint? (I'd ask my doc lady but she is not up on the net at present).

Here are a few facts, points, and thoughts not previously mentioned:

1. At the time of this initial cluster of suicides/homicides at Bragg, there were also two, one a wife killing by a soldier who had not deployed and had not taken malaria prophylaxis of any kind, and one bizarre case where a mother/daughter tag team killed their husband/father on his return from overseas. These could not have been caused by mefloquine, but sometimes they get lumped in to news stories.

2. There is enough evidence for an advocate (think John Edwards!) to build a case that could convince a lay jury, but there is not enough to get an attribution of cause through a scientific peer review.

3. The military has a tendency to give everyone Lariam whether they need it or not. This simplifies administration of the drug, but we had guys taking it at 13,000 feet MSL in Afghanistan in February. Let's just say the mosquito threat is not so great at that place and time. :) So one good thing I am taking away from this discussion and the reading it has made me do is a set of instructions for my unit's docs which I will discuss with our surgeon and get implemented, so only people who will be in malarial areas take malaria prophylaxis.

4. There is apparently a problem with discontinuing one drug and taking another. That means that we can't just take a guy who has

5. As you point out, existence of some side effects doesn't seem to be a marker for the serious side effects. "You don't know who's going nuts till he's all gone," basically.

6. The scientific research into the etiology and prevalance of mefloquine psychosis is inconclusive but definitely shows that more research along these lines is indicated.

7. We have a long way to go before anyone can say with any kind of scientific certainty that the homicides and suicides we have seen were caused or partly caused by mefloquine. We also can't say they are not. What we can say is, "it is possible," which immediately should raise the question of, "how do we determine that for sure?" Which is a question of theory and experimental design at this point, and one hopes qualified individuals will apply themselves here.

8. Brain stem damage may exist in some cases of presumed mefloquine psychosis but it is a post hoc ergo propter hoc logical fallacy to assume causation here. There may be other factors at play, and we can't shout 'Eureka!' yet.

9. We also run into the spinal surgeon's fallacy here: for decades doctors operated on certain discs that were irregular-looking on x-rays, trying to relieve back pain, with results that were just about random. Until someone got the bright idea to make a set of control x-rays of people who were not having back pain, where they found that quite a few of them had the same deformed looking discs as the ones experiencing pain. The point? Clinical observations are useful, but each one is only one data point and there are unintended consequences in reading too much into them.

The bottom line of this is that the whole thing will take quite a bit longer to understand, and longer still to know what action to take. In the meantime, the message from the statistics is to take your Lariam.

d.o.l.

Criminal Number 18F

[MonaMars]

"I presume that the SPECT scan and nystagmus test were prescribed by a physician concerned about some other behavioural issue or complaint?"

Actually, they'd probably never order those tests for a behavioral issue in the absence of concomitant physical problems. PET or CAT scans are usually ordered before a diagnosis of schizophrenia to rule out tumors, but not those. The nystagmus tests would be done to nail down the cause of balance issues and maybe problems with holding eye position, and are often done in conjunction with positional vertigo tests. The SPECT scan is a fancy CAT scan that's quite expensive and not available everywhere and is used to study blood flow in the brain. So it studies function as opposed to just things like white matter disease. They often do them on folks with MS, CFS, neurological lyme, brain trauma, long-term meth abuse, etc. I assume they were ordered on the Larium guys due to cognitive disfunction of some kind - short-term memory issues, dizziness, disorientation, etc.

I'm not a doctor, btw, so keep that in mind.