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Subscribe to RSSTraumatic brain injuries sustained by more than 200,000 U.S. troops may be fueling the military’s suicide crisis, according to a letter co-signed by 53 congressional members who are seeking additional data to investigate the new theory.
In the letter, sent Tuesday to Defense Secretary Chuck Hagel and Veterans Affairs Secretary Eric Shinseki, the lawmakers urged both agencies to provide Congress with a raft of figures, including the number of Iraq and Afghanistan service members and veterans who committed suicide or tried to end their lives after being brain injured by the detonation of an improvised explosive device — “the weapon of choice” in both wars.
“Evidence has suggested that blast injuries, including but not limited to those causing damage to vision or hearing, can have a severe psychological impact ... that can play a major contributing role in suicides,” read the bi-partisan letter.
Between November 2011 and October 2012, there were more than 15,000 IED attacks against U.S. service members in Afghanistan, and 58 percent of all coalition casualties during that span were caused by the hidden bombs, the letter states.
At least three veterans groups, including the Blinded Veterans Association, are backing the congressional push to — as the letter to DOD and VA states — “get a better understanding of the connection between blast injuries and suicide.”
“I’ve talked to a lot of neurologists, military neurosurgeons and trauma surgeons who have all started to ponder if the IEDs that have caused the TBIs are the real cause of the suicides, versus the traditional approach that suicides are all caused by the psychological stresses of combat,” said Thomas Zampieri, head of government relations for the Blinded Veterans Association.
“Let’s collect more information and maybe the epidemiologists will find a way to unlock some of this mystery: Are military suicides actually more related to the brain injuries? I think there may be a big connection,” added Zampieri, who served as a Vietnam-era Army medic. “As the numbers of TBIs go up, the numbers of suicides continue to go up.”
The portion of U.S. service members who sustained TBIs increased each year from 2001 to 2011 — with a total of 266,810 brain injuries diagnosed in American troops between 2000 and 2012, according to the Defense and Veterans Brain Injury Center, part of the DOD. More than 80 percent of those injuries were not deployment-related cases, with many occurring amid crashes of privately owned cars and military vehicles.
Army soldiers account for the vast majority of diagnosed TBI cases, and those injuries range from “mild” (a concussion) to “severe.” Within the Army, the suicide rate among active-duty members has risen from 9 per 100,000 in 2001 to nearly 23 per 100,000 in 2011, according to the American Foundation for Suicide Prevention.
During that same span, according to the DOD’s brain injury center, the number of annual TBI diagnoses among American troops has ballooned from 11,580 in 2001 to 32,609 in 2011 — an increase of 182 percent.
“What is significant is that we are looking at a potential paradigm shift of significant proportion if the link between low-level TBI from IEDs emerges,” said retired Army Col. Bob Morris, founder of the Global Campaign against IEDs.
“The current automatic approach is to connect everything to Post Traumatic Stress Disorder and look at it all as psychological when it may be a physiological,” Morris added.
The lawmakers additionally asked the DOD and VA to supply "specific autopsy findings (of service members or veterans) potentially indicative of prior TBI." The members said they want to know whether such post-mortems found "chronic traumatic encephalopathy", which has been detected in the brains of a number of NFL players who recently committed suicide.
Numerous Iraq and Afghanistan veterans have been diagnosed with both TBIs and PTSD, as well as with hearing loss — the most common disability among the men and women who served in those wars.
"There is no higher priority for VA than the mental health and well-being of our courageous men and women who have served the nation," said a VA spokesman, responding to the congressional letter. "Under the leadership of Secretary Shinseki, VA has made significant progress in providing increased access to mental health care services and strengthening our suicide prevention efforts, but there is more work to do. VA is committed to providing all Veterans the care and benefits they have earned and deserve.”
A Pentagon spokeswoman said Hagel "responds directly to correspondence received" and that it would inappropriate for her comment on the letter.
Rep. Dan Benishek, R-Mich., a surgeon who worked at a VA medical center for 20 years, led the effort to collect congressional signatures for the letter to Hagel and Shinseki.
“Far too many of our veterans and military personnel have taken their own life after bravely serving our nation. Frankly, it’s tragic and unacceptable,” Benishek said in a statement Tuesday. “I am hopeful that by working together we can make sure our guys and gals in the military and the VA have the support they need to recover from the damaging psychological effects of war.”
"There is particular evidence linking suicide to those wounded by IEDs," added Rep. Richard Hanna, R-N.Y. "It is my hope that through additional research we will be able to identify and reverse this painful trend. One suicide is too many and we should do all we can to address this as quickly as possible."
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- Soldier Hard's hip-hop lyrics reveal PTSD's rough edges
Leave a Comment:
How about simply being in a no-win 'suck' situation, both in one's personal life and on the battlefield?
Nobody forced them to sign up for military service.
Hopefully this can be an expedited search of records.
It shouldn't take that long to cross-check the past few years of suicides with any medical history of TBI.
Keep it simple.
How about TBI and PTSD coupled with Anti-depressants, anti-anxiety, and sleeping pills THAT ARE ALL KNOWN TO CAUSE SUICIDE. VA Docs hand pills out to combat vets like candy...Usually at doses up to 4x what civilians receive. Big pharm pays big $$$ to push these pills.
STOP OVER-THINKING IT AMERICA!!!!
ANTIDEPRESSANTS CAUSE SUICIDE!!!! STUDIES HAVE PROVEN THIS.
Brothers, Talk about it with your boys (cuz they got your back - like always) and know what you are putting into your body! Healthy diet and exercise does wonders.
A great generation of young men are killing themselves because they are doped up on PRESCRIBED MEDS. THIS MUST STOP NOW.
11B, OIF3, & Pill free!!!
YES - any loss of physical or mental ability, prematurely, is a huge adjustment.
You don't need 5 years of government/military spending to answer the headline question - common sense tells me that money has far greater needs in helping the injured.
As someone who lost 75% of their physical ability, at the age of 45, you have to re-think everything you do/took for granted. Those of us who's lives revolved around our physical abilities - you feel pretty worthless real fast -
nobodymost don't wantsto be a burden.The drugs I took for depression - gave me half those side affects they warn you about in the commercials - that crap really made me want to die. After finding medical marijuana - I'll never again live in a State that doesn't have medical mj - best anti depressant ever :)
That's the exact attitude service members to NOT need. If not them, then who? You? Your brother? Your kid? Those who volunteer are preventing the need to enact a draft. How about a little gratitude.
I can tell you first hand, not only is the war enough to rattle someone but being treated like sh*t by your own command for the sake of their own egos or desire not to do their jobs, are also contributing factors. Those who know they need help are made to feel weak or called worse than that.
As a service member, I've seen and experienced it far too many times. It becomes too much for some folks.
J. P. Dogly -- on behalf of military men and women everywhere, including my nephew who is in my family the 4th generation serving in time of war and 3rd generation professional military --
"Suicide in the Trenches" by Siegfried Sassoon, a WW I British officer
I knew a simple soldier boy
Who grinned at life in empty joy,
Slept soundly through the lonesome dark,
And whistled early with the lark.
In winter trenches, cowed and glum,
With crumps and lice and lack of rum,
He put a bullet through his brain.
No one spoke of him again.
You smug-faced crowds with kindling eye
Who cheer when soldier lads march by,
Sneak home and pray you'll never know
The hell where youth and laughter go.
Unless you've been in combat, your comment is meaningless.
There are many factors. but I think the catalyst is chemical.
I always feel like vomiting when the mental health "experts" reduce human tragedies to chemical imbalances in brains, as if there were nothing more to a person than a bone vat full of chemical reactions. On the other hand, I might agree with them in this case. Having your brain literally rattled almost to pieces by a 2,000-pound bomb has got to do some serious permanent damage. Nevertheless, pithing those brains with drugs does not seem like a good answer to the problem to me. If someone with a damaged brain is so miserable that they want to die, let them end their life. There is no fate worse than death except being forced to live when you need to die.
Lets talk about everything but the true reason they are killing themselves!! Why can't people see it? Why can't they say it? I have talked to a number of young people who have came back from Iraq "disturbed" and they KNOW what the problem is. They go into these wars being told they are spreading democracy, "making the world safe for democracy" and then they find out the truth, they are killing innocent people to make the world safe for our corporations to loot and plunder the natural resources, they are fighting for capitalism, not for democracy. General Smedley Butler wrote "war is a racket" about this very subject 80 years ago and nothing has changed except the fact that more and more people are waking up to the truth, the plastic patriotism propaganda that the media spews is no longer enough to keep these kids form realizing they are nothing more than trained thugs, murdering in the name of corporate profits.
They can't talk about the real reasons or they would have to admit how corrupt and greedy this country has become.
I only got to serve 2 tours in Afghanistan before I retired from the military. But those 2 tours went something like this. I was there at the beginning of the war for what was supposed to be 1 year. Around 2 weeks before we were supposed to ship home, we were told our relief would be late. We were there another 6 months. I transferred to a new command 2 months after I got home. 2 months later, we were told we were going to Afghanistan for a year. We were there for 15 months instead. Much of the reasons our military was in Afghanistan was to protect the oil pipeline and Chinese interests in that country. You know, that whole global economy thing where our millionaires and their millionaires and everyone else's millionaires need someone to die and protect their interests so they can expand and make a profit.
@deprogrammer - That book, "War is a Racket" it's pretty hard to find. I bought a hardcover copy produced in the 70's for my personal library - pricey - but a great book, short and to the point and the simple truth about why our country goes to war and how a very few make millions from the suffering of many.
I was on Slate within hours of hearing we were going to attack Afghanistan, screaming at the top of my lungs and no one wanted to listen, everyone had overdosed on "freedom fries" and propaganda, someone had to pay for 9/11 and no one cared who it was. I had been following Unocals attempt to talk the Taliban into allowing them to build the central asian pipeline as early as 2000, the instant Bush said we were attacking Afghanistan I knew what it was about, and I knew it had nothing to do with 9/11. Hamid Karzai worked for Unocal prior to George Bush appointing him President of Afghanistan, his first order of business was to sign the bill allowing the pipeline to be built. I have not smiled since 9/11, that was when it hit me square in the face how truly evil my government and the corporations that control it are. Thank you for your service to our country, I am sorry that you risked your life for a lie.
"J.P. Dogly
Nobody forced them to sign up for military service."
As for anything coming from you after that statement as well as the one "
J.P. Dogly
I always feel like vomiting when the mental health "experts" reduce human tragedies to chemical imbalances in brains, as if there were nothing more to a person than a bone vat full of chemical reactions. On the other hand, I might agree with them in this case. Having your brain literally rattled almost to pieces by a 2,000-pound bomb has got to do some serious permanent damage. Nevertheless, pithing those brains with drugs does not seem like a good answer to the problem to me. If someone with a damaged brain is so miserable that they want to die, let them end their life. There is no fate worse than death except being forced to live when you need to die."
You are a someone that is showing your freedom of speech, which by the way is being protected by OMG an all Volunteer Military.
Evidence has also suggested that murdering people in cold blood--in a warzone or not--can have a severe psychological impact ...
Is it not more possible that these suicides have an existential--and not a physiological--cause?
Reading some of these posts...I feel like I've been transported back to 1973...just another kiss from a grateful nation.
If you listen to the mens veterans groups long enough, they spend an awful lot of time spinning their wheels over fact-of-life issues and in some cases, those questions of life which have long been answered by professionals. Anyone watching the suicides of football and baseball teams can easily gather we have raised an entire generation of spoiled brats who are incapable of facing typical and usual life problems. Here is a good reference LINK at Huffington Post to help the VA shut up and sit down and to stop spinning their wheels and wasting our time out here when there are bigger and more solveable problems, like toxic exposure veterans, who can be assisted and not backburnered over Fact-Of-Life issues like this one. see LINK: --- Sue Frasier, Army 1970, national veterans activist. LINK:
@Sue are you aware that head injuries/concussions are being blamed for a good number of the sport suicides?
And, yes, the toxic exposure vets need to get more attention, not to mention a serious review of all the alarming mandatory vaccines given before deployment.
Really Sue? Do professionals have all the fact-of-life answers? If they did we wouldn't be reading this article because there wouldn't be a suicide issue. The fact of the matter is that no one...I repeat, no one has a handle on the suicide issue. It's not just new vets. veterans currently commit suicide at a rate of one every 85 minutes. So what are the experts saying Sue?
How long have you actually worked with veterans? So we're wasting our time with suicide prevention and should shift priority to toxic exposure veterans. I got news for you, most toxic exposure cases among veterans are long past effective intervention. You going to intervene and effectively address my exposure to asbestos? How about the multitude of carcinogens I was exposed to on a daily basis? Is medical science or you going to detoxify me 40 years later? How about we do what we've always done in medicine, save who we can and move on to the next. By the way, your comment about an entire generation of spoiled brats...make that about 4 generations because I've worked with suicidal veterans from WWII forward. Have a nice day.
Lotta water under the bridge since 1970, lets see how the current crop of non-male combat veterans turns out during the next decade. Navel gazers all.
I posit that the suicide follows from seeing what they were fighting for, and finding it empty of truth.
We fought, many were wounded, some died so that fat, ignorant people could go to Walmart and complain? We offerred our lives to support a country where people choose to remain unaware of the world outside their parish?
They choose death before further dishonor.
The theory of IED induced TBI then a link to suicide is plausible. They used to call it shell shock. Nearby explosions can cause serious head injuries. Their brains get rattled. Plus, the horrors of war just make it worse.
The real problem is not on the battlefield, but right here at home. Liberal Dumbocrats tend to view soldiers as mere hired killers out to impose America's will, while conservative Repugnicans see the military as only a means of maintaining the wealthy's lifestyles. In either case, soldiers are not particularly welcomed when returning from service. How would you feel with Dumbocraps picketing against you or with Repugnicans cutting back programs to help veterans?
I can tell you how I'd feel. I left the service originally in 1973. We had the left wing spitting on us for killing too many, we had the right wing spitting on us for not killing enough...and you might never have stepped foot in-country, but that didn't matter. Many of us found ourselves not welcome with the American Legion or VFW because "we lost a war". No, of course we didn't lose a war, but that was many of the "greatest generations" reactions to us back then.
You think programs have been cut back now? You have no idea. I'm really sorry you don't feel you were welcomed back but if you feel you weren't ...you're in good company.
I joined the Marine Corps in 1974, but ended up stationed in Hawaii the entire time.......Not even sure I can remember exactly WHY I signed up. It wasn't out of a sense of 'patriotism'. I probably did so on a dare from friends after a bunch of recruiters showed up at our high school. It was interesting, but the whole Vietnam thing MUST have been winding down at that point.........I don't think I'd have joined if I thought I'd actually end up in a war zone. Of course, you never know these days......
Military people are trained to fight battles and kill people. When they are forced to be nice to murdering Arabs and aren't allowed to kill the enemy, then are thrown back into 'civilization' with no acclimatization or assistance, I'm sure it's extremely difficult.
I retired in 2011. For the last year of full data that I saw (2010), almost half (something like 47%) of the soldiers who had committed suicide in the 8 years prior were first term soldiers who had never deployed and were not sceduled to deploy when they took their own lives. I would presume that the numbers would be similar for 2011-12. So exposure to combat or IEDs as this article implies could not have been a factor in those cases.
The number of soldier suicides used to be well below national averages by demographic. However, for whatever reason military suicides has now matched (and for some sub-groups) are exceeding civilian numbers. But I don't think combat exposure is the answer...although it may be part of the answer.
Are brain injuries from IED blasts causing the military suicide crisis?
This headline has got to be one of the stoopidest ever!
People kill themselves because they fail to swallow the crap they have been fed by the military. War is not normal its the exception unless you live in the US where its a vocation. *shaking my head in disbelief
Possibly the realization that their "commander in chief" is a socialist out to destroy America has something to do with it.
Possibly you are an idiot? ...why yes...yes it is possible you are an idiot! Thank you for your contribution.
Make that "Commander and Thief" !
$16,000,000,000,000 stolen from the people and climbing..
How many Americans did Bush's war in Iraq kill? Just so he could be a wartime president like daddy. Wouldn't you consider those live lost to have been stolen from their families? Of course folks like you are more concerned with money...ya gotta love teabaggers. Why not document that figure by the way.
agreed Doc and now Jeb bush is making noises ..
Ol_Doc,
"How many Americans did Bush's war in Iraq kill? Just so he could be a wartime president like daddy. Wouldn't you consider those live lost to have been stolen from their families?"
Very well said, I totally agree.
Bush was possibly even more moronic and evil than Obama, although it's extremely close. Both are narcissistic megalomaniacs who should be strung up for treason and the total waste of the lives, minds and bodies of our brave and honorable (something that Bush and Obama never were and never WILL be!) service personnel for absolutely nothing whatsoever other than their own pathetic egos.
One thing about Bush was his lack of a poker face. When they told him about the 911 attack on TV in Florida the look on his face spoke volumes about what was going on behind the scenes.
jpooch00-1527514
In this case I hate to have to agree with you but the last non-narcissistic megalomaniac who served as President of the United States was Jimmy Carter. You might not have liked the guy but at least he wasn't narcissistic.
Hey Doc,
Well, I can't argue with you on that point! Ol' Jimmy was as straight & down-home as they come.
Actually, I voted for him & kinda liked him too! He just seemed like a regular guy who tried to do his best without making too big of a fuss about it.
Things didn't work out too well right there at the end, but again, I think he just did his best but bad luck prevailed.
jpooch00-1527514
Got to agree with you on your characterization of President Carter. You always knew what he said, he believe to his core. I think he got a seriously bad rap with the Hostage Crisis. Remember the US Military was in it's early post Vietnam years and we really didn't have many options. It was Carter that originally authorized Delta, but the mission failed and he took the rap.
He also turned out to be one of (if not the) greatest former presidents we've had. All those years of assisting the poor (Habitat for Humanity) and the Carter Center, Nobel Peace Prize, Special US Envoy. Like I said, you may not have liked him but by nearly anyone's definition, he is a good man.
They need to see if any of the suicides played football, and then ban the NFL.
I know first hand why many commit suicide, it is because of neglect. While they were away fighting, their families are all suddenly without pay, and months to fix it. Medical care for their dependants were put on hold. Incompetence is rampant throughout the military, officers and enlisted alike. When they come home to despair, finding their families neglected, mistreated and the betrayal of what they supposedly did for their country, and the appreciation is suffering for their loved ones. This story goes on and on, the Obama administration abandoned our military as he is now, sequestering our government employee's to give to the low ghetto a*s voters that he promised a bigger handout to for votes. The money is supposedly has to come from somewhere. So, take from the taxpayer, give it to the drug infested welfare recipient, and what happens when their no more tax revenue, it will be in your face on the streets. Burning, looting as they have always done when they can't get their way. This time Obama wants you disarmed, so they will give him a revolution, stay in power. I hate these so called intelligence reports about why things are a certain way. I was receiving briefings way before all this on suicide, they knew before hand it would be a trend because of the treatment of the soldier, family, veteran, and the taxpayer. When are you going to get fed up with the lies. What they claim isn't the case, fabricated to put the blame elsewhere. Sorry state of existence we live in. Impeach them all.
juggernaut-1214494
Seek help man.
Is this part of a bigger problem thru out this country ? Most of the mass killers the last couple of years are young white and not really poor males , who shoot large numbers of innocent people and then kill themselves! This would not seem to be just a military problem but something much deeper and darker thats wrong in this country and should be studied country wide and not just in the military! Since I'm sure there'll be those who take issue with this step back and look objectively at all the mass murders since columbine. a couple of american born asians and a couple of black men otherwise most others fit the profile!
I for one am not getting your point? Check out the profile of mass murderers in general. With the exception of race, the profile also fits middle-eastern suicide bombers, IRA terrorists, boy soldiers in Africa...you name it. It also pretty much fits soldiers in general. Old men start wars but young men have to fight them.
Ol_Doc
Old men start wars but young men have to fight them.
.. and for what !
It's pure Evil for old men to prey on the ignorance of the young to instigate wars for them to be thrown into to die. Brings back memories of the old Roman days and the lions. .. Nothing's really changed in the World.
warrren
Man has not evolved...only his technology.
I can't think of any group less fit to conduct any kind of scientific investigation than members of Congress.
In the 60s and early 70s when our military personel came back home there ere jobs to return to, not today?
Too bad minimizing collateral damage matters more than our troops.
And all this was supposed to get so much better when Obama came into office.
50% of these Traumatic Brain Injuries, TBI's, are preventable. However the the Government canceled funding for the improved helmet system due to sequestration.
War isn't a football game idiot. Only people whining are the parasites sucking on the government tits.
It is not a decrease in government spending only a 3% cut.
Omama will keep on printing bogus bills with the help of the Federal Reserve Banksters.
Best hedge against inflation is to convert all your worthless dollars into Debt.
Well maybe if we didn't have all those bases overseas then we can build and research all the best armor and weapons for the next fools to test us.
Since sequestration went into effect a couple of days ago...your comment makes absolutely no sense...please provide a link to your source.
It's cultural. "The Greatest Generation," from WWII, didn't see suicide as an option. They built a nation.
Times change.
Run to the nearest church, boys, run. Find a place where times don't change. It'll save your life.
Science will tell you that the "supernatural" is fictional. Well, take a look at cutting-edge physics -
The Big Bang
Quantum Teleportation
2-dimensional Time
The Observer Effect
Who's observing you? Who's observing the universe?
Really Congress---you are asking the VA to get a better grasp on the connection between IEDs and suicide...that's like asking any police force to police themselves. Are you-Congress-that stupid? Apparently you are. And we wonder why NOTHING EVER gets done in Congress...maybe you-Congress-should have a better understanding of how STUPID you are. But then again STUPID has nothing to do with it. It is IGNORANCE on both counts. You know what the issues are you just choose to ignore so that you pockets are full and careers are not ruined.
marlene's opinion
Congratulations on your satirical, entertaining comments. Of course they have no basis in reality what so ever, but they were entertaining. The Veterans' Health Administration conducts some of the most groundbreaking medical research in the world including such projects as an effective malaria vaccine, Alzheimer's and Dementia Care and treatment, TBI differential diagnosis...and a whole lot of other research projects. The VA teams up with folks like Stanford University, University of Oregon Health Science Center and other medical research universities all over the country. Next time you decide to make flippant comments, at least make an attempt to check your facts.
What's causing this crisis is when you can't justify what you did when it was done for a lie.
Before becoming a soldier, they had no brain injury; then the brain injury is caused by a war and during a tour. Have they compared the status, regarding to the brain injury and suicide, of other soldiers from other nations?
Not everyone that has committed suicide over there got hit with an IED though. C'mon the constant worrying of being capped by either an IED or a sniper, or a bomb would make some folks go overboard. It could be the troops feeling bad for stuff that might be even considered war crimes like in Vietnam with the nature of the the guerilla warfare being practiced, where you don't know who the enemy is. If a guy pumps a poor kid full of AR-15rounds and all the kid had was like a toy or a ball, that would cause anguish, etc. Too many of our men and women are comiiting suicides, and it isn't because of brain trauma.
This is a red herring. The suicide rate among active duty personnel is 2 1/2 times what it was in 2001? You mean when we were not in any wars and very few of our troops were being exposed to the horrors and stresses of war, then coming back completely unable to readjust to regular, "not being shot at" society? You think that might be kicking it up a bit?
2001: Yeah, I just did a tour in South Korea (or Germany, or Japan, or stateside). Boring, but pretty cool.
2011: Yeah, I just finished my 3rd tour in Iraq/Afghanistan and I can't drive down the street because I think an IED will blow me up and when I close my eyes all I see are my friends getting killed/wounded.
Completely the same, right? /sarcasm