Studies will assess reproductive health and birth outcomes using hospitalization records of gulf war veterans compared to a nondeployed control group. The analyses should be complete by this fall. Additionally, DoD is collaborating with the VA to conduct a large, randomized epidemiologic study of 30,000 veterans. Again, gulf war veterans will be compared to a nondeployed military population. Data collection is expected to begin late this summer.
Research is also under way to identify the health effects of exposure to depleted uranium.
Research is currently progressing to identify possible interactive effects of certain chemical compounds used during the gulf war with pyridostigmine. For those who may not be familiar with pyridostigmine bromide, it is a pill that, when used as a pretreatment, provides meaningful, therapeutic enhancement to injectable treatment of nerve agent-exposed patients. These studies will evaluate the health consequences of the Persian Gulf war and will contribute to the development of programs to protect the health of military personnel during future deployments. There are two sets of funds that we are using to fund Persian Gulf-related research. In both cases we are working with the Persian Gulf Veterans Coordinating Board.