Non-combat injuries, illnesses are No. 1 hazard in Iraq

[Barrett808]

Source: McClatchy Newspapers

Non-combat injuries, illnesses are No. 1 hazard in Iraq
By Jay Price | McClatchy Newspapers
Posted on Tuesday, October 30, 2007

CAMP VICTORY, Iraq — High blood pressure, bad backs, bum knees and other mundane health problems put three and a half times more troops on planes to hospitals in Germany or the United States than do snipers and roadside bombs, say front-line experts in Iraq.

"There's nothing about being deployed or being in an austere environment that protects you from the normal maladies that people encounter in the United States," said Lt. Col. Ron Ross, a preventive medicine officer with the U.S. Army's 62nd Medical Brigade in Iraq.

From the invasion in March 2003 through Oct. 1, 2007, more than 36,000 U.S. troops were evacuated from Iraq. More than 77 percent of those were for illnesses or non-combat injuries, according to data from the Department of Defense, Deployment Health Support Directorate.

Most eventually return, said Ross, but the illnesses and accidents still cut into troop strength.

Read more: http://www.mcclatchydc.com/iraq/story/20851.html

[BOSSHOG]

1. If these Soldiers had to pay for and provide their own health care

there would be a lot less malingering and goofing off. We need to weed these malcontents out and instill some good ole fashion conservative values in the rest who are left. Providing soldiers with health care? What kind of liberal communistic nonsense is that? There's a war going on people, straighten up.

Note from poster: This is just one more example of how I fail at sarcasm.

[DeaconBlues]

3. Don't give any "Support Our Troops!" republicans any bright ideas

It might end up in a congressional bill in the near future

[Bonobo]

2. Is this what you see if soldiers were intentionally injuring themselves?

Just wondering. It's what I would do to get out of 130 degree heat and constant danger of death and mutilation.

[tom_paine]

4. The same was true on the Eastern Front in DubyaDubyaTwo

That's what the Nazis said (well, not that exactly, but something very similar).

What, are you telling me we can't trust the pronouncements of Nazis and Bushies?

Really, why that's shocking!

[robcon]

5. That was true in the U.S. Civil War, too.

n/t