Mystery Deaths Fuel Vaccine Anxieties; Recent pneumonia deaths among soldiers who have been injected with the anthrax and smallpox vaccines are renewing fears that the inoculations are unsafe

0 Comments | Insight on the News, Sept 30, 2003 | by Timothy W. Maier

Byline: Timothy W. Maier, INSIGHT

Since Persian Gulf War II began about 6,000 soldiers have been shipped home for recovery. Of these, 1,200 were wounded in combat. Many of the others consider themselves part of an army of "walking dead" troops who appear to be so physically and mentally exhausted that the military has no recourse but to discharge them. Why they are ill has become a matter of intense debate inside the Pentagon. Some claim a series of anthrax and smallpox vaccinations made them so gravely ill that they have trouble breathing or sleeping and have experienced a loss of memory. Others have been diagnosed with lupus and heart problems. At least six died shortly after rolling up their sleeves to receive the anthrax and smallpox shots. But the Pentagon dismissed related claims with such regularity and intimidation that many GIs tell Insight they no longer report the illness. They are told to "suck it up" and move on.

"Don't blame the vaccinations" has been a Pentagon mantra since it began inoculating nearly half a million troops almost two years ago and pumping millions of dollars into BioPort Corp., the Lansing, Mich.-based sole supplier of the anthrax vaccine [see "A Dose of Reality" and "Why BioPort Got a Shot in the Arm," Sept. 20, 1999]. But an alarming outbreak of more than 100 suspected pneumonia cases among Gulf War II veterans serving in Iraq and southwestern Asia has drawn the ire of Congress.

Rep. Chris Shays (R-Conn.) held eight congressional hearings on the safety of the vaccination while chairman of the House Government Reform subcommittee on National Security, Emerging Threats and International Relations, and issued a seething report that found serious safety and regulatory problems with the vaccine. Now Shays is asking again, "Could these vaccinations be hurting our troops?" The Pentagon reluctantly admitted that two Army soldiers Spc. Joshua M. Neusche, 20, of Montreal, Mo., and Sgt. Michael L. Tosto, 24, of Apex, N.C. died from complications arising from pneumonia on July 12 and June 17, respectively. The Army is investigating their deaths. Between 1998 and 2001, the U.S. Army Center for Health Promotion and Preventive Medicine reported 17 soldiers died from complications of pneumonia. The Pentagon has confirmed that this year at least 17 others have been placed on respirators but insists the vaccinations have nothing to do with the deaths or illness.

The two pneumonia-related deaths reported recently apparently are an understatement. Family members of Army Spc. Zeferino E. Culunga, 20, of Bellville, Texas, and Staff Sgt. Richard S. Eaton, 37, of Guilford, Conn., claim their sons died in August after being diagnosed with pneumonia. A third death involved Spc. Rachael Lacy of Lynwood, Ill. According to her autopsy, "smallpox and anthrax vaccinations" contributed to her death on April 4 after she first had been diagnosed with pneumonia.

When the victims' families reached out to Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld, he ordered a team of military investigators to Germany and Iraq to review the recent pneumonia cases. "We as a family are concerned that we are not being told the truth," wrote the family of Spc. Neusche in an Aug. 12 letter to Rumsfeld. Like the other families, they asked to see medical records in an effort to get a second opinion on the cause of death. Culunga died of acute leukemia. Lang was never deployed, so she is not considered part of the cluster of pneumonia cases. "It is our right to receive truthful, honest and unfiltered answers just as the military required truth, honesty and commitment from our son," says the Neusche-family letter to Rumsfeld.

But the Army is not investigating the deaths of Culunga or Lacy, and is awaiting autopsy results for Eaton.

Besides those who died from pneumonia-like complications, families of six others claim the vaccinations contributed to their sons' deaths including two who committed suicide because, say the complaints, the vaccinations made them so seriously ill thatit destroyed their will to live. While the U.S. Food and Drug Administration has acknowledged the nature of these deaths, the Pentagon has not because military doctors have refused to confirm that the vaccines contributed to the deaths of any of these victims.

Despite mounting criticism, the Pentagon repeatedly claimed the pneumonia cases had nothing to do with the anthrax or smallpox vaccinations. "In 200 years of vaccination, no vaccine has ever been shown to cause pneumonia, and there are multiple reasons to believe that the vaccines have no role," Col. John D. Grabenstein, deputy director for clinical operations at the Military Vaccine Agency, told United Press International.

Could Grabenstein be wrong? During congressional hearings on the vaccination program in 1999, Pentagon officials acknowledged there had been three reports of serious illness coincidentally associated with the vaccination involving hypersensitivity pneumonia. A study last year in Pharmacoepidemiolgy and Drug Safety said the vaccine was the cause of pneumonia in two soldiers. But Grabenstein dismisses such evidence. In fact, in his recent study of vaccination patients published in the Journal of the American Medical Association (JAMA), he insists there have been no deaths related to the smallpox shot. He ignores the Lacy case because she was never deployed overseas.