The services also must better document events affecting deployed service members' health, a lesson learned from the Gulf War, Cowan said. In the future when events occur that make us suspicious, we need to be on top rather that try to figure it out later on. Even as the new rules are being written, the services are developing and implementing the initiatives, Cowan said. Another Gulf War lesson is the need to involve people in their own health management, he said. In the anthrax vaccination program, we're spending a great deal of time explaining to people why we're doing this.
Anthrax is a kind of poster child for force health protection.
We have a terrible, dangerous risk of mass destruction and a safe vaccine that can essentially eliminate that risk. In Bosnia and Southwest Asia, those levels are below what you see in folks stationed back home. Cowan's office plans to publish a capstone document this summer that outlines force health protection measures for the next 10 years. The staff also has begun rewriting the joint medical doctrine. Both documents will reflect the initiatives DoD is taking to better protect forces and take care of their families, Cowan said.