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Army: No unusual factors in pneumonia cases
(CNN) -- Two epidemiological teams investigating pneumonia cases among U.S. military personnel in the Persian Gulf region have so far found nothing indicating they were caused by unusual factors, an Army doctor said Tuesday. There have been about 100 cases of pneumonia among military personnel in the area since March 1. Fifteen of those had to be treated with respirators, and two later died. As of Tuesday, no evidence existed that the pneumonia cases were caused by exposure to chemical or biological weapons, said Col. Robert DeFraites, chief of preventive medicine of the Army surgeon general's office. SARS and Legionnaires' disease also were ruled unlikely, DeFraites said. In addition, he said that medical teams have found no connection at all with Gulf War Syndrome, a variety of symptoms and illnesses that developed among troops involved in the Persian Gulf War in 1991. DeFraites said that the military is focusing on the 15 most serious pneumonia cases and that reports on the two deaths would be completed in the next week to 10 days. "The fact that two have died, I think, is probably the one issue that has prompted the commissioning of our epidemiological consultation," he said. "... Two occurring in one area of the world in about a month was enough to cause us concern. I don't know statistically how that works out, but it was enough to cause us to be concerned." One of the fatalities was in Iraq, according to David Tornberg, deputy assistant defense secretary for clinical and program policy. Fourteen of the respirator cases were soldiers, and one was a Marine. All but one were men. DeFraites couldn't provide an age range for the 15 but said that "they're all active-duty military people." "There's no evidence that this is spread from one person to another. It does seem to be sporadic in nature," he said. "No two of the cases share any common unit or exact day or time." One team of doctors, an epidemiologist and an infectious disease specialist, is at Landstuhl Regional Medical Center in Germany, where most of the patients have been treated, according to Lyn Kukral, an Army surgeon general spokeswoman. The second team has been sent to Iraq, where most of the cases occurred, Kukral said. The team will sample soil, water and air. Cases also occurred in Uzbekistan, Kuwait and Qatar, she said. The teams will review patient records and lab results and question health workers and patients to try to determine the cause or causes. "They may all be different," Kukral said. The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention in Atlanta, Georgia, has been consulted, but no CDC officials are involved, she said. Typically, pneumonia requiring hospitalization occurs in about nine of 10,000 soldiers per year, an Army statement said. "Based on this historical number, the approximately 100 total cases of pneumonia in [U.S. Central Command] since March 1 do not exceed expectations," it said. From 1998 through 2002, 17 soldiers died from pneumonia or its complications, the Army said.
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