Gulf war illness not in veterans' heads but in their mitochondria

[HereSince1628]

Source:
University of California, San Diego Health Sciences

Summary:
Veterans of the 1990-91 Persian Gulf War who suffer from “Gulf War illness” have impaired function of mitochondria – the energy powerhouses of cells, researchers have demonstrated for the first time. The findings could help lead to new treatments benefiting affected individuals -- and to new ways of protecting service persons (and civilians) from similar problems in the future.

<more>

http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2014/03/140327222210.htm


-------------------------------------------
I'm glad for this finding. Small sample size, but it looks promising.

It'd be great to have a real explanation beyond blaming vets for playing "old soldier".

[Recursion]

1. A big problem is there's a new cause for GWS advanced every week or so

Sarin. Sarin antidote. Aspartame in plastic bottles. Tungsten. The molybdenum that replaced the tungsten. The uranium that replaced the molybdenum. Oil fire smoke.

GWS is real, but we don't even know if we're dealing with a single syndrome or not, nor whether it's pathogenic or environmental (though the latter seems much more likely, all things considered). We don't know which combinations of the cocktail of stuff people were exposed to, and whether it's even one combination. And we aren't being very good at looking for the symptom cluster in other populations (assuming it's environmental, that thing or things certainly was present for some other group of people, somewhere). So we can't even say with any confidence that Gulf War Vets get GWS at a higher rate than civilians, or vets of other periods.

[Lurks Often]

2. Additionally, not everybody in a given unit got sick

and those that do get sick, didn't even come down with the same illness.

My former National Guard unit served in Desert Storm (I joined a year after the war) and some came down with unusual illnesses for their age, some even died. But others in the unit to this day are perfectly healthy and have healthy children.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gulf_War_syndrome

My own theory, which I have nothing to base it on, is that it was the soldiers with a less robust immune system were the ones that got sick due to a variety of causes.

[KT2000]

3. We are looking at a new

category of disease. It intersects at genetics and environmental exposures. A person's genes could have been affected by what their grandparents and parents were exposed to, which could make them respond differently to toxic exposures - such as various genes switching on and off.
Those who served were exposed to many toxic materials in a short period of time.

The models for toxicology are not serving us now as looking at a single toxin causing a particular illness, or "the dose makes the poison" are outdated concepts at describing human bodies that are exposed to many toxic materials and have had their genes altered through generations.

The civilian population is experiencing the same issues but they are regarded on an individual basis - exposures in the work place, sick building syndrome, mold illness etc. Mostly they are regarded as mental cases.

Compounding the issue is the fact that only the sick and the few researchers want the answers. Business and government do not want to "open the floodgates" to necessary changes and potential liabilities.