More Than 600 Reported Chemical Exposure in Iraq, Pentagon (ignored but now) Acknowledges

[CBS]

More Than 600 Reported Chemical Exposure in Iraq, Pentagon Acknowledges

"More than 600 American service members since 2003 have reported to military medical staff members that they believe they were exposed to chemical warfare agents in Iraq, but the Pentagon failed to recognize the scope of the reported cases or offer adequate tracking and treatment to those who may have been injured, defense officials say.

The Pentagon’s disclosure abruptly changed the scale and potential costs of the United States’ encounters with abandoned chemical weapons during the occupation of Iraq, episodes the military had for more than a decade kept from view.

..."​

And yet CFS/ME patients (and perhaps more importantly, those who claim to be speaking on our behalf) repeatedly turn to this same government expecting to be listened to.

The P2P and IOM were not designed to meet patient needs. They were designed to serve the NIH and the CDC and if they accidentally do patients any good (or more likely - harm) then I guess that just couldn't be helped.

 

[alex3619]

OK, something like 600 report possible exposure. How many never noticed an exposure, only the effects?

 

[Ecoclimber]

How the medical, health and disability insurance companies conspire to make an illness disappear.

Johns Hopkins medical unit rarely finds black lung, helping coal industry defeat miners' claims

Part 2 of a 3-part series, 'Breathless and Burdened: Dying from black lung, buried by law and medicine'

...More than a half-dozen doctors who have seen the X-ray and CT images of his chest agree he has the most severe form of black lung disease. Yet his claim for benefits was denied in 2011, leaving him and his family to survive on Social Security and a union pension; they sometimes turn to neighbors or relatives for loans to make it through the month.

The medical opinions primarily responsible for sinking his claim didn’t come from consultants-for-hire at a private firm or rogue doctors at a fringe organization.

They came from a respected household name: the Johns Hopkins Medical Institutions.

The Johns Hopkins University often receives attention for its medical discoveries and well-regarded school of public health, and its hospital recently was ranked the nation’s best by U.S. News and World Report.

What has remained in the shadows is the work of a small unit of radiologists who are professors at the medical school and physicians at the hospital. For 40 years, these doctors have been perhaps the most sought-after and prolific readers of chest films on behalf of coal companies seeking to defeat miners’ claims. Their fees flow directly to the university, which supports their work, an investigation by the Center for Public Integrity and ABC News has found. According to the university, none of the money goes directly to the doctors.

Their reports — seemingly ubiquitous and almost unwaveringly negative for black lung — have appeared in the cases of thousands of miners, and the doctors’ credentials, combined with the prestigious Johns Hopkins imprimatur, carry great weight. Their opinions often negate or outweigh whatever positive interpretations a miner can produce.

For the credibility that comes with these readings, which the doctors perform as part of their official duties at Johns Hopkins, coal companies are willing to pay a premium. For an X-ray reading, the university charges up to 10 times the rate miners typically pay their physicians...
.

 

[alex3619]

Class action lawsuit against Johns Hopkins (though probably the specific area or individuals)?

 

[CBS]

I've come to the conclusion that at it's heart, the real weakness of our modern health care systems are their bureaucratic structures and the insecurity that these structures breed.

Insecurity keeps otherwise well meaning doctors from even considering alternative hypothesis in the face of the predominant (psychosocial) paradigm's utter failure to explain, predict and treat the symptoms of ME.

Bureaucrats strive for nothing if not the indefinite perception of their necessity to a cause or an organization. The patients' disease is simply a vehicle by which they achieve their selfish ends.