Air Force Al Udeid Air Base Hep and HIV Exposure?

Air Force: 135 Patients May Have Been Exposed to HIV, Hepatitis
Military.com
by Oriana Pawlyk
20 Jun 2017

The Air Force said patients with questions or concerns may reach out to their healthcare resolution specialist at the following contacts: U.S. Eastern Daylight time zone or outside the continental U.S.: (937) 656-3818; U.S. Pacific or Mountain time zone, Hawaii, or Alaska: (707) 423-3443; and Central time zone: (228) 376-5603.

FILE -- Air Force doctors perform a diagnostic procedure on a patient. (Air Force File Image)

The U.S. Air Force is notifying 135 patients who received colonoscopy or endoscopy procedures at Al Udeid Air Base in Qatar that they may have been exposed to blood-borne diseases such as HIV or hepatitis.

Air Force Medical Services announced Tuesday that scopes used for the upper and lower gastrointestinal procedures over an eight-year-period from April 2008 and April 2016 at the base clinic were not properly cleaned in accordance with Food and Drug Administration guidelines, Office of the Air Force Surgeon General spokeswoman Larine Barr told Military.com on Wednesday.

As a result, patients could have been exposed to possible viral infections that include human immunodeficiency virus, known as HIV, "and two kinds of Hepatitis (B and C)," Barr said. "The risk of infection is very small, particularly in a deployed environment, but we recommend that patients receive diagnostic testing," she said in an email.
read more here

VA To Cover Hep C Treatments Again

With More Funding, VA to Cover Vets Requiring Hepatitis C Treatments
Military.com
by Bryant Jordan
Mar 10, 2016

The Veterans Affairs Department said Wednesday it will now be able to cover the costs of caring for all veterans with hepatitis C for the current fiscal year, regardless of the stage of the patient's liver disease.

VA Under Secretary for Health Dr. David Shulkin said the expanded care is the result of increased funding from Congress as well as reduced drug prices.

The department last year allocated $696 million for new hepatitis C drugs, accounting for 17 percent of the VA's total pharmacy budget. In fiscal 2016, which began Oct. 1, the VA expects to spend about $1 billion on hepatitis C drugs.

"We're honored to be able to expand treatment for Veterans who are afflicted with hepatitis C," Shulkin said in a statement. "To manage limited resources previously, we established treatment priority for the sickest patients."

With the expansion, the VA now expects many more veterans will be started on hepatitis C treatment every week through the current fiscal year, which ends Sept. 30. The department statement did not address 2017 costs, though it has requested $1.5 billion in its next-year's budget for the hepatitis C treatments and clinical resources.
read more here

Vietnam Veterans Fighting Hep C Point to Jet Guns

Vietnam vets blame 'jet guns' for their hepatitis C
OC Register
By LILY LEUNG / Staff writer
February 14, 2016

The VA and the device’s manufacturer dispute that. But the Vietnam Veterans of America, a Maryland-based nonprofit, in recent months adopted the jet gun issue as one of its causes, due to mounting evidence and member concerns.

A small, yet increasing number of military veterans, mainly those who served during the Vietnam War, are receiving VA disability benefits in connection to Hepatitis C. Here, an Army veteran gets his annual liver ultrasound at Henry Ford Hospital in Detroit. DETROIT FREE PRESS VIA ZUMAPRESS.COM

Near the end of the Vietnam War, Lynn Seiser lined up with other fresh-faced Army recruits to await a dreaded, often bloody ritual.

Along with millions of other members of the military, Seiser, then 21, received his service vaccines not by way of disposable syringes but with needleless “jet guns” that blasted drugs into each arm using puffs of high pressure. The U.S. military at the time touted the medical device for its ability to immunize veterans en masse, cheaply and safely.

However, the guns often weren’t sterilized between uses and “if you flinched, it ripped you open,” said Seiser, a former longtime Orange County resident and clinical psychology professor. “If anyone in the line had something, everyone would be exposed.”

Decades later, a growing chorus of Vietnam War veterans like Seiser and medical experts – including some doctors within the U.S. Department of Veterans Affairs – argue that the inoculators, since removed from use, were a likely vehicle for the hepatitis C virus.

During the Vietnam conflict alone, at least 4.7 million service members were administered vaccinations in this manner, based on one government report that said 235,000 recruits were injected by jet gun each year over a span of three decades. An FDA hearing cites much higher figures: It said the Department of Defense jet gun vaccinated 20 million to 40 million military personnel from 1965 to 1980.
read more here

$163 billion appropriated for VA operations

Budget deal nails down fiscal 2016 spending for DoD, VA
Military Times
By Leo Shane III, Staff writer
December 16, 2015
(Cutting right to where the VA comes in)

The $163 billion appropriated for VA operations in fiscal 2016 includes $71.4 billion in discretionary funding, an almost 10 percent jump in that account from fiscal 2015 levels.

The total includes $7.5 billion for mental health care operations, $4.9 billion to cover medical costs of Iraq and Afghanistan war veterans, $4.7 billion for female-specific health care programs, and $7.5 billion for institutional and other long-term support of aging veterans.

Lawmakers matched the VA's request for $1.4 billion to support efforts to help homeless veterans, to continue efforts to reduce the number of vets living on the streets.

They also added $1.5 billion to the White House budget request for new Hepatitis-C medications, treatments that have proven to be lifesaving for VA patients but significantly more costly than officials predicted earlier this year.

The bill contains almost $700 million in additional funds related to the VA's first-time disability claims backlog, which has fallen from about 612,000 cases in spring 2013 to fewer than 78,000 claims this month. But lawmakers say the money is needed to help eliminate the backlog and ensure similar problems don’t surface again.

On construction, the bill includes $1.24 billion for major projects and $406 million for minor projects, matching department requests after months of lawmaker complaints about mismanagement and waste in the construction programs.

House and Senate leaders are hopeful the measure can be finalized before Christmas, possibly as early as this weekend.
read more here

More of the same on mental health since they are not changing anything.  The OEF and OIF veterans extra spending is for the 5 years they get free care even without a claim. Things to be happy about are the additional funding for female veterans which has been disgracefully late, more funding for homeless veterans and Hep C treatments.  As for the claims, we've been on this rollercoaster ride before.

Deal avoids shutdown, but not everyone is happy
CNN
By Deirdre Walsh and Ted Barrett
December 16, 2015

Washington (CNN)House Speaker Paul Ryan told Republican lawmakers Tuesday that congressional leaders reached an agreement on a massive $1.1 trillion bill to fund the government through September, setting up votes later this week that would avert a shutdown, according to multiple lawmakers who attended a closed door session with the speaker.

The deal would suspend two major Obamacare taxes, lift the ban on crude oil exports, reauthorize a health insurance program for 9/11 first responders, as well as include cybersecurity legislation and overhaul the visa waiver program, barring anyone who had visited Syria, Iraq and other possible terrorist hotspots in the last five years from entering the U.S. without a visa.

Leaders also struck an accord on a broad package of tax breaks worth about $600 billion, which makes permanent several key provisions for businesses related to research and development and expensing.
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VA Outsourced and Rationed Care for 180,000 Veterans with HepC

VA to outsource care for 180,000 vets with hepatitis C
The Arizona Republic
Dennis Wagner
June 21, 2015

A VA clinician who asked not to be named for fear of retaliation stressed that department leaders "haven't told anybody how it works. They've sent out a solution with no way to implement it."

The Department of Veterans Affairs is moving to outsource care nationwide for up to 180,000 veterans who have hepatitis C, a serious blood and liver condition treated with expensive new drugs that are costing the government billions of dollars.

The VA has spent weeks developing a dramatic and controversial transition as patient loads have surged and funding has run out. Those efforts were not disclosed until records were released this week to The Arizona Republic.

Instructions on how to carry out the program show that the sickest veterans generally will get top priority for treatment. However, patients who have less than a year to live or who suffer "severe irreversible cognitive impairment" will not be eligible for treatment.

That provision, and the mass shifting of patients, drew immediate criticism from veterans advocates.

Tom Berger, executive director of a health council established by Vietnam Veterans of America, ripped the VA for launching a "faulty plan" and blasted the idea of medical teams deciding which patients will be denied antiviral remedies.

"They've set up what I would call, in Sarah Palin's words, 'death panels.' ... Maybe rationalization panels is a better term," Berger said.
read more here

Thousands of Vietnam Veterans Fight Hepatitis C Battle

The VA’s Hepatitis C Problem
Newsweek
BY GERARD FLYNN
5/9/15

Approximately 174,000 veterans in government care have been diagnosed with hepatitis C, but an additional 50,000 are thought to carry the infection unbeknownst to them.

Army veteran Richard Gudewicz, 52, of Trenton, Michigan gets

his annual liver ultrasound at Henry Ford Hospital in Detroit.

SUSAN TUSA/KRT/NEWSCOM

Martin Dames is a highly decorated veteran of the Vietnam War. He received the Bronze Star for heroism in the combat zone and three Purple Hearts for injuries he suffered while fighting. He made it out alive, only to find out years later that those combat wounds got him infected with the hepatitis C virus (HCV), a deadly blood-borne pathogen discovered in 1989 that claims about 19,000 lives annually, a large number of them veterans. That number is growing every year.

A chronic infection in around 80 percent of cases, HCV often shows no signs of its corrosive presence until extensive liver scarring occurs after decades of infection. In some cases, the disease isn’t found until it has led to cirrhosis—advanced and potentially lethal amounts of scarring. Infection with the virus is a leading cause of liver cancer and transplants in the U.S.
read more here

Colorado VA Employee Quit Job to Save Homeless Veteran

Feds investigate veteran's death 
KUSA Melissa Blasius
February 2, 2015

GRAND JUNCTION - Federal investigators will visit a Colorado VA hospital this week to determine whether a patient died due to inadequate care. Whistleblower Chris Blumenstein worked at the Grand Junction Veterans Affairs Hospital as a social worker, and he says he investigators from the Office of Inspector General will interview him Tuesday.

Last year, Blumenstein quit his job in protest as he advocated for a Vietnam-era veteran named Rodger Holmes. Holmes was a formerly homeless veteran who was suffering from Hepatitis C. Blumenstein said Holmes should have been treated by a liver specialist, but the Grand Junction VA did not have one on-staff and did not make a referral for outside care.

Holmes died just before Christmas, and Blumenstein believe Holmes would still be alive if he had received better care from the VA. read more here

VA rationing new hepatitis C drug to treat Agent Orange Vietnam Veterans

Sky-high price has VA rationing new hepatitis C drug
Jacksonville Daily News
December 26, 2014

Senator Bernie Sanders

Sen. Bernie Sanders, I-Vt., used one of his last hearings as chairman of the Senate Veterans Affairs Committee to review how VA has had to ration a break-through medicine that cures hepatitis C, a liver virus infecting 174,000 veterans, because a course of treatment — 84 pills over 12 weeks —- costs VA almost $50,000 per patient.

Sanders said the biopharmaceutical company Gilead Sciences, Inc., of Foster City, Calif., stands to earn more than $200 billion on a new drug called Sovaldi. When combined with still toxic antiviral medicines including interferon injections, Sovaldi cures hepatitis C at a 90 percent rate, and does so faster and with fewer side effects than past drug regimens.

That a cure has been found is good news, Sanders said, especially for veterans who are infected with hepatitis C at three times the rate of the general population. Vietnam War-era vets are hit particularly hard because of battlefield blood exposure, non-sterile vaccination routines, wartime sharing of razors, drug abuse and recruit demographics from the last draft era.

What’s disturbing and “astounding,” Sanders said, are pill prices set by Gilead. VA has budgeted $1.3 billion to buy Sovaldi over the next two years to treat mostly patients with advance liver disease or liver cancer, said Michael Valentino, chief consultant for VA Pharmacy Benefits Management Services.

There’s money enough for 25,000 to 30,000 patients, he said.
read more here

Veterans Harder Hit By Hep C

At The Crossroads, Part 6: Veterans Harder Hit By Hep C
Rhode Island NPR Radio
By KRISTIN GOURLAY
December 5, 2014

Sen. Bernie Sanders (I-VT) chairs the Senate Committee on Veterans Affairs. At a hearing Wednesday, Dec. 3, Sanders wanted to know why new hepatitis C drugs cost so much and how the VA was going to pay for them.
Credit Screenshot of live stream of hearing

Dennis was a young Marine training at Camp Pendleton, ready to deploy.

“I was on my way over, I was in what they call staging,” said Dennis. “13, 16, 17 days, then send you over to Okinawa, then Vietnam. I got lucky.”

That is, if you call blowing a knee out lucky. It saved him from going to Vietnam. Soon after that, Dennis isn’t sure when or how, he got infected with the hepatitis C virus.

“I didn’t do any intravenous drugs or anything like that,” Dennis said. “My ex had it, I don’t know if I got it from her.”

Dennis is 63. He’s from Providence. He doesn’t want us to use his last name because of the stigma hepatitis C can carry. It’s a disease he’s been living with for decades. That’s partly because, until this year, his treatment options were pretty grim. But the years of hoping for something better to come along are over. Doctor Alexis Pappas gives Dennis the good news in an exam room at the Providence VA.

“So as you’ve probably heard in the news,” Pappas explained, “there’s a lot of new treatments for hepatitis c and the VA has all those available now for your genotype.”

Pappas tells Dennis she’ll start him on treatment right away. And chances are excellent that after 12 weeks he’ll be cured. But that cure comes at a price. One new hepatitis C drug, Sovaldi, costs $84,000 dollars for a full course. The VA managed to negotiate that down to about $50,000 dollars.

But with more than 170,000 veterans living with hepatitis C, the price is still too high for strained budgets.

“So most of our veterans have been carrying disease for the past three, four decades,” said Promrat. “And now it’s the time when the full-blown manifestations of chronic liver injury come to light. And we’re now dealing with that, right now.”

Dealing, he says, with a ten-fold increase in the number of patients with liver cancer. Rising numbers of patients needing liver transplants. More veterans with cirrhosis and liver failure. All consequences of untreated hepatitis C.
read more here

No postings yet for HIV-positive Marines, sailors since policy change

No postings yet for HIV-positive Marines, sailors since policy change
By Matthew M. Burke
Stars and Stripes
Published: May 22, 2013

SASEBO NAVAL BASE, Japan — More than nine months have passed since the Navy decided to open up overseas and large-ship platform assignments to HIV-positive sailors and Marines, but not a single sailor has gotten such a posting.

The Navy’s Personnel Command is grappling with how to implement the instruction, which also covers blood-borne pathogens like hepatitis B and C.

Secretary of the Navy Ray Mabus handed down the policy in August 2012.

Personnel Command officials declined to comment on when the policy would actually take effect. Instructions can take time to implement, Personnel Command spokesman Lt. Cmdr. Rob Lyon told Stars and Stripes in an email.

“Navy Personnel Command recently completed a review of SECNAVINST 5300.30E, dealing with blood-borne pathogens, to ensure sailors affected will have the greatest opportunity to be successful, and any concerns by their receiving commands will be addressed,” Lyon said. “We will more than likely have more to discuss once the Milpersman article (implementation guidance) has been chopped by all parties.”
read more here

Bravo Company 1978 and Hep C Germany veterans seek justice

UPDATE
Artie is starting a support group for all veterans with hepatitis c so we can help one another deal with the virus and over time prove it was transmitted by air gun and needle while in service.

This support group is for all veterans and any that wish to get it started with me please have them contact me at my email arthurfryer2beking@yahoo.com or my home (3520503-2569). If they leave a message I can call them back at the end of the day.

Earlier today I received a phone call from a veteran about what happened to him in Germany because of the some of the Hepatitis C posts I have up.
Vietnam veterans and Hepatitis C jet gun delivered
Bush shafts Hepatitis C veterans
Hepatitis C Cases Appearing More In Vietnam Veterans and this one about a Florida veteran winning his lawsuit after a colonoscopy

I told him a couple of things he could try and one of them was getting his story more out in public so that maybe, just maybe he could get some justice for himself but he wanted to do it for other veterans more. That's right! As soon as I said it could help other veterans, he agreed right away. So here is his story along with a couple of responses he received from other veterans.

Kathy, in Dec 1978 I was stationed with the 1st bn 39th mechanized infantry 8th infantry division Baumholder Germany with Bravo company from sept 19 1977 to sept 26 1980.

In dec we received a flu shot in the basement of Charlie company from the medics and it was alive vaccine. When we got there for the shot they switched to a needle since the air gun stoped working just before we got there.

They took the needle and inserted into the vial vaccine and one after the other gave us the shot. In line in front of me was a guy named cagola,red and roy and not long ago I talked with roy who informed me he had hepatitis at the time of the shot.

I was later that evening taken to the infirmary since I eneded up with the flu and had a temp of 104.6 and was labled patient #52 with many still coming in after me.

The medical staff were short of people and when they could not get my temp down they started a IV which was already used on another patient.

A guy in Charlie company who I believe was a medic was supposevely murdered in jan 1979 but when I checked on it the soldier they said was killed by the bieder meinhoff gang also known as the red faction army killed the guy with a ice pick and took his id. I checked and found that soldier was killed in 1985 long after I was there but the guy in Charlie company was a medic and thios was the story they spred about his death.

I have found out besides myself that six others in my unit endedup with hep c and 2 alone were in my platoon ,one was from csc company and at the time I was told we were quarantined due to tb breakout and after talking with others found out it was hepatitis.

I have the proof to prove it happened and hope some is willing to listen on the facts that it can be spred my air gun innoculations and my fondest hope is to help all veterans past and present. My home number is 352-503-2569. Im sending a pic of me and my girlfriend so you know what I look like. god bless artie

He received this reply

I for sure do NOT have it, but remember that 1/39 was deemed Non Combat Ready for a period of time over this. That's why we were warned in formation. I have about 6 friends on facebook that were in my company back then that may remember it. If you would like to try to contact them I could see if any remember this incident.

and this one from another veteran

I am doing well thanks. Hope all is well considering your medical condition. I do remember the outbreak of hepititis in the 1/39 Infantry. I don't remember exact year, but I was in Baumholder from 1978-1982. What I remember was my medical platoon sergeant was totally again the air gun for innoculations. But also in that same time frame, I don't know if it were 1/39th Infantry or the 1/87th Inf there was a medic(s) that got into the safe that store narcotics that were to be used in war time. The medic(s) used needles and syringes to break through cellophane and draw the narcotics out. Those narcotics were inventoried monthly by a disinterested person and inspected annually by the division surgeons office. Why I mention this to you as there was discussion that possibly some folks contracted the hepititis virus as some folks shared needles when using the narcotics. In fact, the virus was found in a medic who died of overdose.

If there is something I can help you with I will. Of course, it's been 35 yrs ago or so, so my memory isn't the greatest....but I do remember that out break.

If it happened to you too, get your story out there and give lawyers a chance to fight for you. You shouldn't have to fight for what you have been dealing with, but you are not fighting alone.

716 patients at VA may have been exposed to HIV and Hepatitis

716 patients at VA may have been exposed to HIV
Buffalo News
BY: JERRY ZREMSKI
NEWS WASHINGTON BUREAU CHIEF

WASHINGTON – More than 700 patients at the Buffalo VA Medical Center may have been exposed to HIV, hepatitis B or hepatitis C because of the inadvertent reuse of insulin pens that were intended to be used only once.

The possible reuse of the insulin delivery devices occurred between Oct. 19, 2010, and Nov. 1, 2012, the U.S. Department of Veterans Affairs said in a memo sent Friday to local members of Congress, which The Buffalo News obtained.

“There is a very small chance that some patients could have been exposed to the Hepatitis B virus, the Hepatitis C virus, or HIV, based on practices identified at the facility,” the memo said.

The VA told local lawmakers that 716 patients at the facility may have been exposed to the reused insulin pens, and that 570 of those patients are still living.
read more here

FDA issues warning over Hepatitis C drug

FDA issues warning over Hepatitis C drug
Army Times
By Patricia Kime
Staff writer
Posted : Thursday Dec 20, 2012

The Food and Drug Administration is warning patients receiving treatment for hepatitis C with a triple drug regimen using Incevik, or telepriver, to be aware of a potentially dangerous, even fatal skin reaction.

The FDA on Wednesday announced it has altered Incevik’s label to include stronger warnings after some patients died from complications after developing a serious rash while taking Incevik along with two other medications for hepatitis C.

More than 2,700 active duty service members were diagnosed with chronic hepatitis C between 2000 and 2010, according to Pentagon data.

The Veterans Health Administration system has 170,000 patients with chronic hepatitis C, and more than 4,800 VA patients are receiving some kind of combination drug therapy for Hepatitis C.
read more here

Florida Vet Wins $1.25M in Hep C Case Against VA Hospital

Vet Wins $1.25M in Hep C Case Against VA Hospital
Nov 23, 2012
Miami Herald
by David Smiley

A failure by Miami Veterans Affairs Medical Center staff to properly clean colonoscopy equipment likely infected a patient with hepatitis C, a federal judge ruled Wednesday.

U.S. District Judge Adalberto Jordan awarded U.S. Air Force veteran Robert Metzler and his wife a combined $1.25 million in their medical malpractice case against the United States government. Metzler, 70, and his wife, Lucy Ann Metzler, had sued for a combined $30 million.

Metzler was one of more than 11,000 veterans who received colonoscopies with improperly-cleaned equipment between 2004 and 2009 at VA hospitals in Miami, Murfreesboro, Tenn., and Augusta, Ga., according to an investigation by the VA's own Administrative Investigation Board.
read more here

Florida veteran wins lawsuit

Florida veteran wins lawsuit over Hepatitis infection

Veteran wins lawsuit over hepatitis infection he got at Fla.
VA hospital; several US cases
By Associated Press
Published: October 11

MIAMI — A Miami federal judge ruled in favor of a veteran who says shoddy hygiene practices at a Veterans Administration hospital caused his hepatitis infection.

Air Force veteran Robert Metzler and his wife in a lawsuit are seeking $30 million in damages. The ruling Thursday says damages will be settled later.
read more here

First VA colonoscopy trial begins in Miami
A trial began Monday on behalf of a U.S. Air Force veteran from Coral Gables who is claiming millions in damages, claiming he contracted life-threatening hepatitis C from a colonoscopy done with improperly cleaned equipment at the Veterans Administration

First VA colonoscopy trial begins in Miami

First VA colonoscopy trial begins in Miami


A trial began Monday on behalf of a U.S. Air Force veteran from Coral Gables who is claiming millions in damages, claiming he contracted life-threatening hepatitis C from a colonoscopy done with improperly cleaned equipment at the Veterans Administration
BY FRED TASKER

FTASKER@MIAMIHERALD.COM

Air Force veteran Robert Metzler says his life is ruined. His attorney says Metzler, of Coral Gables, faces a future of exhaustion, loss of sexual companionship and the threat of cirrhosis or liver cancer. But the lawyer defending the Veterans Administration says Metzler might be cured of the underlying condition, hepatitis C, within a year.

Those were the sharply contrasting opening statements presented in Miami federal court Monday in a medical malpractice case filed against the VA. It’s the first such case that has gone to trial after some 11,000 U.S. military vets learned that the colonoscopies they had at three VA hospitals, including Miami’s, were performed with improperly cleaned equipment.


Read more: First VA colonoscopy trial begins in Miami

Psychiatric Center patients warned of hepatitis risk

Patients treated at Rockland Psychiatric Center warned of hepatitis risk
BY JANE LERNER • JLERNER@LOHUD.COM • FEBRUARY 16, 2011

ORANGEBURG — At least one patient contracted hepatitis B at Rockland Psychiatric Center and state officials are testing hundreds more to see if anyone else was infected, possibly through the use of a blood-sample lancing device.

The state Department of Health issued an advisory Tuesday so anyone who was treated at the hospital at the same time as the patient who contracted the disease would get tested.

All 229 people who might have been exposed to blood-borne diseases while they were at the state-run psychiatric center have been identified and contacted, said Jill Daniels, a spokeswoman for the state Office of Mental Health.

Blood tests are being done on those people to see if they were infected with hepatitis B, hepatitis C or HIV while they were at the Rockland hospital. No other cases have been identified yet, Daniels said.

The Rockland Psychiatric Center advisory was the second time in a week that the state warned patients who had been treated at a hospital that they might have contracted a blood-borne disease.

Patients treated at a pain management clinic run by South Nassau Communities Hospital on Long Island were warned that they might have been exposed to hepatitis C.
read more here
Psychiatric Center warned of hepatitis risk

Hepatitis C Cases Appearing More In Vietnam Veterans

Hepatitis C Cases Appearing More In Vietnam Veterans

By MIKE BOWERSOCK
Published: January 17, 2011

BEXLEY, Ohio --
It is becoming a battle that doesn't end for Vietnam veterans.

Medical writers researching VA medical centers claim that between 10 and 20 percent of veterans from the Vietnam era have hepatitis c.

"It can remain undetected, usually remains undetected for 20 to 30 years and then all of a sudden things start to show up with you," said Dennis Agin, who has the virus.

Agin is a navy veteran and was a doctor in Vietnam.

"I did unprotected surgery in Vietnam," said Agin.

In fact, that's where the disease is showing up: among medics from Vietnam.

"If they were medics and they went to a wounded person, they're going to get that person's blood on them and if they had a cut on their body or it went in their eyes they're going to pick up the disease," Agin said.

It is believed that the disease could have also been passed with air injection inoculations, but it is among the medical veterans where it is showing up more frequently.
read more here
Hepatitis C Cases Appearing More In Vietnam Veterans

Vietnam veterans and Hepatitis C jet gun delivered?

Roger That: Local vet wants others to be aware of hepatitis C dangers
April 1, 2010, 6:10 pm


Shaun Brown is on a campaign to make Vietnam veterans aware that their segment of the population faces what he calls "a grave epidemic."

Shaun is from Newfield, the son of a Vietnam vet who died last year -- the result, Shaun says, of the hepatitis C virus that he believes can be traced to his dad's service in the war.

"Medical professionals believe the high prevalence (of HCV in veterans) points to a single causality," Shaun wrote recently.

"Jet gun injectors have been at the forefront of possible causes."

Well, certainly one possible cause. There are many others, but let's go with this for now.

The jet gun, for those who haven't had the pleasure, was used to administer several immunizations at once by firing the fluids, with high pressure but no needles, into the upper arm.

read more here
Local vet wants others to be aware of hepatitis C dangers

16 patients have hepatitis in Army needle scare

16 patients have hepatitis in Army needle scare
By Alicia A. Caldwell - The Associated Press
Posted : Tuesday Mar 10, 2009 16:27:31 EDT

EL PASO, Texas — Army officials say 16 patients exposed to a mismanaged insulin needle program have tested positive for hepatitis B or C.

The William Beaumont Army Medical Center patients were among more than 2,000 diabetics who may have been exposed to blood-borne illnesses between August 2007 and January 2009 because of the program that systematically gave multiple patients injections from the same insulin pen.

Officials at the Army hospital at Fort Bliss have said it’s unclear if the patients contracted hepatitis from the injections.