“Protecting the health and
informed consent rights of children since 1982.”
Groups Renew Attacks On Anthrax Inoculations
By MICHAEL KILIAN
Chicago Tribune
February 13, 2001
WASHINGTON - Two groups representing 10 servicemen and
women discharged or disciplined for refusing to take the controversial anthrax
shots asked President Bush on Monday to grant amnesty on compassionate grounds
to all who refuse the vaccinations.
The groups, Citizen Soldier and NO ABUSE, also asked the
White House to halt inoculations immediately and to reconsider the Clinton
administration policy requiring the shots for all U.S. military personnel.
They contend that the vaccinations are a serious health
hazard and are causing valuable personnel to leave the military in large
numbers.
“It should be no problem for this administration to grant
compassionate
amnesty for people whose health is under fire,” said retired
Air Force
Reserve Col. Redmond Handy, president of NO ABUSE, a
serviceman’s advocacy
group
The mass inoculations were ordered in 1997 by Defense
Secretary William Cohen as a preventive measure against the possible use of
anthrax biological warfare weapons by terrorists or nations such as Iraq that
have bitter disputes with the U.S.
Since then, 500,000 servicemen and women have received
full or partial immunization. Widespread reports of adverse health effects from
the shots prompted hundreds of refusals, many of them resulting in
courts-martial and general discharges.
A General Accounting Office report released last fall
found that one-quarter of the 176,000 pilots and crew in the Air Force Reserve
and Air National Guard have quit or asked to be reassigned to avoid the
vaccinations.
The House Government Reform Committee has urged that the
program be suspended. Supplies of the vaccine are dwindling because the only manufacturer,
BioPort Corp. of Michigan, has been unable to produce replacement batches that
meet federal standards.
In December the Pentagon limited the inoculations to
personnel assigned to the Persian Gulf region. Pilots and aircrew must receive
them because they could be sent to the gulf region on short notice.
Disciplinary actions against personnel who balk at the
shots have continued. The Pentagon
maintains the vaccine is safe and that most side effects are not serious.
The advocacy groups contend that the shots have produced
grand mal seizures, blackouts, severe bone and joint pain, excessive fatigue,
blood pressure problems, vision difficulties and skin problems.
New Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld has not yet
indicated whether he will reconsider the policy of service-wide inoculation.
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