Gulf War Syndrome case: Jabs link

Monday, May 5, 2003 Posted: 7:28 AM EDT (1128 GMT)

Hundreds of British and U.S. soldiers have complained of similar illnesses known as Gulf War Syndrome

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LONDON, England -- A British soldier has won a landmark judgment against the government linking injections with his so-called Gulf War Syndrome.

A War Pensions Appeal Tribunal said that a "concoction of drugs" given to Alex Izett before the first Gulf War in 1991 was responsible for his osteoporosis, or brittle bone condition.

Izett, a former Lance Corporal with the Royal Engineers, was injected with the same drugs as those soldiers who went to the war zone, despite not being sent himself.

He has suffered from similar symptoms to hundreds soldiers including fatigue, digestive and psychological problems, depression, wasting muscles, and nausea.

Izett said the illnesses and 10 year legal fight had taken his "dignity and livelihood." He now hoped the judgment would act as a "watershed" in having the condition officially recognized.

"I hope this judgment will have a knock-on effect and that the MoD (Ministry of Defence) will now finally tell the truth," he said.

"I'm not only pleased for myself, I'm delighted for the Gulf War veterans community as a whole... I just hope that this opens the floodgates for more cases to come forward."

The tribunal gave its verdict last December, but its publication was delayed until after the latest war in Iraq.

"The concoction of drugs caused osteoporosis," Reuters quoted the ruling as saying.

The British government, which has consistently denied that medical proof exists for Gulf Veterans Syndrome, said it disagreed with the verdict but would not contest it.

Defence Minister Lewis Moonie said Monday: "There is no evidence whatsover of any systematic harm."

But he added there was no legal basis on which the ministry could appeal the tribunal's judgment.

"The tribunal is not competent to make that kind of decision," he told the BBC.

"The tribunal's purpose is to determine whether a war pension should be awarded or not, and it is awarded on the basis of whether we can show beyond all reasonable doubt that a condition was not due to a person's service.

"The reason they found was that we were unable to show that the injections did not cause this problem."

He said further experiments were taking place to show the reason for the illnesses. It has been blamed on a series of factors including stress, smoke from oil-burning wells, and depleted uranium.

Veterans' groups have welcomed the verdict, saying claims should be made for vaccination damage.

Charles Plumridge, senior coordinator for the UK National Gulf War Veterans Association, said: "We are now calling on the (ministry) to officially confirm that we are ill because of the inoculation we were given."

Campaigners say that it is the first official confirmation of the existence of the syndrome, which veterans blame for a range of ailments including

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