National Defense Authorization Act for Fiscal Year 2008

Floor Speech

NATIONAL DEFENSE AUTHORIZATION ACT FOR FISCAL YEAR 2008 -- (Senate - September 28, 2007)

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Mr. SANDERS. Mr. President, let me begin by discussing amendment No. 3082. I appreciate the opportunity, and I look forward to working with Senator Warner and others early next week on this issue.

The amendment I am offering, along with my colleagues Senators Byrd, Bond, Burr, Feingold, and Webb, would authorize $15 million in funding for gulf war illnesses within the Department of Defense's congressionally directed medical research programs. These funds would go to a peer-reviewed research program open to researchers inside and outside of Government, focusing on the chronic effects of neurotoxic exposures, body functions underlying the illnesses, and the identification of treatments. This funding level matches the funding level that is included in the Defense appropriations bill passed out of the committee a few weeks ago.

This research is done by the Congressionally Directed Medical Research Programs, which is a research organization focused on finding and funding the best research to eradicate diseases to protect the health of current, future, and former members of the Armed Forces, while also benefiting the overall health of the American public. Importantly, a few days ago, as a member of the Senate Veterans' Affairs Committee, I can tell my colleagues that we had a very interesting hearing where we heard from the colonel at the DOD who runs this program using the $5 million appropriated by Congress last year to them, and the colonel described what has been happening. She reported to us that there was a great deal of interest in the initial solicitation for research proposals. They received 80 proposals. They recently granted $4.4 million to nine researchers from prestigious academic institutions across the country to find treatments for gulf war illnesses.

The truth is, this is an issue that I and many others in Congress have been working on for many years. The reality is that in the first gulf war, as a result of service in the first gulf war, we have today well over 100,000 soldiers who are suffering--veterans who are suffering from a myriad of illnesses which we call gulf war illness. Some of these illnesses reflect themselves as fibromyalgia. Some people have headaches. Some people have short-term memory loss. Some people have gastrointestinal problems. We heard testimony from a young woman whose life, as a result of her service in the gulf, has been radically changed and her health has significantly deteriorated. There is a great deal of evidence that many of the children born to those men and women who served in the gulf, including this particular woman, were born with significant problems and disabilities.

I would be less than honest if I did not say that substantial sums of money went to the DOD and the VA--and believe me, as a member of the Government Reform Committee in the House, I spent dozens of hours--dozens of hours--along with Representative Chris Shays of Connecticut listening to testimony. I have to tell my colleagues that from many people in the veterans organizations, there was extreme frustration with the actions of the VA and the DOD; that, in the very beginning of this process, refused to even recognize the problem, and then what they said is: Well, maybe it is a psychological problem. There was a widespread feeling that the VA and the DOD were not responding to the real problems impacting tens and tens of thousands of our soldiers who returned.

We have an obligation. Obviously, right now, all kinds of attention is being paid, appropriately enough, to our soldiers who come home from Iraq, who come home from Afghanistan. We are worried about TBI, traumatic brain injury; we are worried about post-traumatic stress disorder, and we should be. But we cannot in good conscience turn our backs on the tens and tens of thousands of soldiers who today are suffering from their service in the first gulf war. They are hurting.

The good news is there is now a line of research being developed through the DOD organization that I mentioned before, and that is the Congressionally Directed Medical Research Program that is beginning to have some results. Without going into great medical and scientific analysis, what they are beginning to find is that as a result of the extremely toxic theater that existed in the gulf war, including burning oil wells, bromide given as an anti-nerve gas agent, DEET being used to protect soldiers from mosquitoes, and of course the saran released into the air, what researchers are now beginning to find is that there appears to be brain damage that is the cause of some of the symptoms our soldiers are seeing, and we are beginning to see more, very promising research in this area.

My concern is if you talk to the veterans of the gulf war, they will tell you that there is a very high level of frustration about the huge amounts of money being spent by people who didn't even acknowledge or appreciate the pain our soldiers were experiencing. So what this amendment does is focuses research into those areas where we are already seeing some significant progress. That is what this amendment is about. I look forward to discussing this issue further with the members of the relevant committees when we return next week. That is one of the amendments we are working on.

AMENDMENT NO. 2905

The other amendment is amendment No. 2905, which deals with a very immediate crisis. The former amendment deals with what happened 16 years ago. This is an amendment dealing with the problem we are seeing today. I don't have to tell anyone in this body that the studies are very clear that we are likely to see a record-breaking level of post-traumatic stress disorder coming from service in the theater in Iraq. It appears at this point, based on several studies I have read, that the numbers will be a lot higher than Vietnam, and God only knows that Vietnam was high enough. I think the evidence is pretty clear that we did not do a good job in addressing the post-traumatic stress disorder of those soldiers who came home from Vietnam.

Now, what this amendment does is it would create a $30 million pilot project--and I should indicate this amendment is supported by Mr. Sununu of New Hampshire, Mr. Kerry of Massachusetts, and Mr. Brown of Ohio, the sitting Presiding Officer. It builds on a program, a small program we developed in the State of Vermont. Here is what the issue is.

We can put zillions of dollars into research and into treatment for PTSD, but it will only do a limited amount of good if we don't bring those soldiers who are hurting into the facilities and into the counseling for them and their families that could provide help. I can tell you that in a rural State such as Vermont, where you have people from the National Guard who do not have the active-duty military infrastructure, a lot of these men and women will come home from Iraq, they will return to their small towns, and they will be hurting, their kids will be hurting, their wives will be hurting, and they are not going to stand up and say: You know what. I am having nightmares or when I go through a tunnel, I am having a panic attack.

That is not what they are going to do. They are going to sit home and suffer and not know how to reach out for counseling. Some of them will be embarrassed; that is part of the problem.

The history of the VA and the DOD is not good in knocking on doors and reaching out. What we have done in Vermont, working with the National Guard, in cooperation with the VA, is we established what we call a door-knocking program where we have men and women who have served in Iraq who are going into our communities and knocking on doors, sitting down and having a cup of coffee, talking to the families, asking them how things are going. The conversation might be: My husband hasn't been able to sleep. Oh, really. And they have that discussion. It is reaching out. The problem they may be having is a problem that may be experienced by tens of thousands of other people who went to Iraq. That is what this program is about.

Some people say the VA has done a good job historically in outreach, but I don't believe that. I offered an amendment when I was in the House to counteract a rule that said the VA cannot do any outreach at all. So we have a major problem called post-traumatic stress disorder. Part of the problem is people are not going to stand up and say: I am hurting, how can I get help? I think the answer, to some degree, is to have people who served in Iraq knock on doors, and maybe they are dressed in blue jeans, maybe they are not, but to come in an unofficial and informal way, sit down, have a cup of coffee, and try to assess what is going on.

I appreciate the support of the Presiding Officer for this amendment, as well as others in the Senate. It is a very important amendment. I believe we owe it to our soldiers. I look forward to continuing this discussion early next week with my colleagues.

With that, I yield the floor.

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