Pentagon spends $300M to study troops' stress, trauma

[flashl]

By Gregg Zoroya, USA TODAY

The Pentagon is spending an unprecedented $300 million this summer on research for post-traumatic stress disorder and traumatic brain injury, offering hope not only for troops but hundreds of thousands of civilians.

The money — the most spent in one year on military medical research since a $210 million breast cancer study in 1993 — will fund 171 research projects on two of the most prevalent injuries of the Iraq and Afghanistan wars.

Gregory O'Shanick, national medical director for the Brain Injury Association of America, says the funding initiative is "without a doubt … an all-time high" for spending by the government on post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD) and traumatic brain injury (TBI). He says civilian victims will benefit directly from the military studies.

By contrast, the National Institutes of Health, the world's largest government sponsor of medical research with an annual budget of $28 billion, spends about $80 million per year on TBI research, according to the NIH.

What? Is the Pentagon saying the RAND April 2008 study, "Rand Study Estimates PTSD Figure is 1 in 5", is unacceptable?

Or, is this just another "we will studying 'it' until they are all dead" delay? "We", studied and continue to study, agent orange, Depleted uranium (DU), Traumatic brain injury (TBI), women soldier rapes, and soldier suicides.

[unhappycamper]

1. I'd rather spend $300,000,000 on a PTSD/TBI study

than $239,000,000 for another F-35 Lightening.

[flashl]

2. I would be inclined to agree if study meant accelerated delivery to soldiers and communities,

these studies appear to support groups already at the MICs trough.