Status of Canadian Gulf War Veterans
During the 1991 Gulf War, Canada deployed sea, land, and air forces to the Persian-Gulf region as part of the Coalition forces against Saddam Hussein. About 4,500 Canadians served in the theatre, and no one reported any serious casualties at the time.
However, since then, there has been a series of complaints by some Gulf-War veterans about their overall health. Gulf-War veterans from several other Coalition nations (most notably the United States and the United Kingdom) have also reported that they were experiencing symptoms and illnesses that they believed were caused by, or aggravated by, their service in the war.
In 1992, the medical services in the various countries began to realize that the Gulf-War veterans seemed to be displaying some common symptoms, and the issue gained a higher profile. The first studies of the alleged Gulf-War Syndrome began at about that time.
In September 1992, the Canadian Forces Medical Service (CFMS) advised Canadian Forces medical personnel to exercise vigilance and to notify Headquarters if any Canadian cases appeared. Specialists at the National Defence Medical Centre (NDMC) in Ottawa soon began treating a small number of symptomatic Gulf-War veterans. Centre staff readily diagnosed some specific problems, but some individuals complained of a variety of ailments which, although easily identified as illnesses, were not clearly connected with the Gulf War. In fact, they occur among other Canadian Forces members who did not serve in the Persian Gulf, and also among members of the general Canadian population.