America's North Shore Journal

A hos­pi­tal corps­man with the 2^nd Marine Expe­di­tionary Brigade teaches a Marine how to insert a nee­dle into a vein as part of a Com­bat Life­saver Course here March 24. Marines gain this knowl­edge so they can sup­port corps­men in the field in need of assis­tance. Photo by Cpl. Aaron Rooks

Com­bat­ing insur­gency in Afghanistan is not the only chal­lenge await­ing the Marines and sailors of the 2^nd Marine Expe­di­tionary Brigade.

In addi­tion to enemy com­bat­ants, Marines deploy­ing to Afghanistan’s Regional Command-South will also face a num­ber of poten­tial health threats.

The Cen­tral Asian coun­try has been labeled by the World Health Orga­ni­za­tion as one of the least devel­oped coun­tries in the world, with 70 per­cent of the pop­u­la­tion liv­ing in extreme poverty and health vulnerability.

Sev­eral food-, water-, animal-, and vector-borne dis­eases are found com­monly through­out the coun­try. The most com­mon of all, accord­ing to Afghanistan’s Min­istry of Pub­lic Health, is malaria.

More than half of the country’s pop­u­la­tion, espe­cially women and chil­dren, are vul­ner­a­ble to malaria, accord­ing to an April 2008 report from the Inte­grated Regional Infor­ma­tion Net­works, the human­i­tar­ian news and analy­sis ser­vice of the United Nations Office for the Coor­di­na­tion of Human­i­tar­ian Affairs.

The Min­istry of Pub­lic Health and WHO esti­mated that up to 1.5 mil­lion cases of malaria occur each year through­out Afghanistan, most of which go untreated.

The 2^nd MEB Health Ser­vices Sup­port Sec­tion iden­ti­fied malaria, bac­te­r­ial and pro­to­zoal diar­rhea, hepati­tis A, rabies, typhoid and paraty­phoid fever as the dis­eases of high­est risk in Regional Command-South. The med­ical staff has also iden­ti­fied tuber­cu­lo­sis, hepati­tis E, sand fly fever, typhus, leish­ma­ni­a­sis, west nile fever and anthrax as some of the inter­me­di­ate risks present in the Mari­nes’ future area of operations.

Navy Petty Offi­cer 3^rd Class Matthew Siruchek, a hos­pi­tal corps­man with 2^nd MEB, said pre­ven­tive med­i­cine is key for Marines and sailors deploy­ing to the region.

The Walden, N.Y., native, who deployed to Afghanistan with the 24^th Marine Expe­di­tionary Unit from March to Octo­ber 2008, said malaria was their largest concern.

“Pre­ven­tive treat­ment and edu­ca­tion made the dif­fer­ence,” he said. “We always preached to them to take their med­ica­tions once a week and they would be covered.”

Med­ica­tion includes Meflo­quine, a treat­ment used to com­bat malaria, which is trans­mit­ted pri­mar­ily by mosquitoes.

The HSSS is tak­ing these pre­cau­tions and oth­ers. Navy Senior Chief Petty Offi­cer Shan­non Dit­tlinger, med­ical oper­a­tions chief for the HSSS, said her team of corps­men and Navy doc­tors has worked dili­gently since Feb­ru­ary to ensure the brigade is med­ically ready.

The Weirs­dale, Fla., native said they have sprayed uni­forms and sleep­ing sys­tems to deter disease-carrying insects, ordered the nec­es­sary med­ica­tions and con­ducted health, den­tal and neu­ro­log­i­cal assess­ments. They have also per­formed vac­ci­na­tions to pre­vent dis­eases such as yel­low fever, anthrax, small­pox, hepati­tis A, typhoid and measles.

But Navy Petty Offi­cer 2^nd Class Jose Gon­za­lezramos, a hos­pi­tal corps­man and pre­ven­tive med­i­cine tech­ni­cian for the brigade, said there’s no pre­ven­tive med­i­cine offered for Marines to com­bat some of the dis­eases found in Afghanistan.

The Mau­navo, Puerto Rico native said edu­ca­tion plays the largest role in com­bat­ing these dis­eases and other med­ical con­di­tions overseas.

“If Marines lis­ten to what we rec­om­mend to them, they will be health­ier,” he said. “If there is a shot that can pre­vent you from con­tract­ing dis­eases, why not get it? If you know a water source is con­t­a­m­i­nated, why go near it? If Marines or sailors con­tract any of these dis­eases, they will be taken out of the fight tem­porar­ily or permanently.”

The HSSS team mem­bers said they are pre­pared in case any­one con­tracts one of the many dis­eases in the coun­try, which the brigade med­ical plan­ner, Navy Lt. Diana Lof­f­gren, said is pos­si­ble. She said there are cur­rently sev­eral con­firmed cases of malaria in troops serv­ing in Afghanistan, but noted that none of these cases involve U.S. ser­vice members.

Despite the threats, the MEB med­ical per­son­nel remain con­fi­dent in the deploy­ment being a success.

“I’m 100 per­cent con­fi­dent in the corps­men and doc­tors who will be tak­ing care of the brigade’s med­ical issues, whether they are com­bat casu­al­ties or dis­eases,” Dit­tlinger said.

USMC
by Cpl. Aaron Rooks