Larium effects on U.S. Troops

Another cost for U.S. troops is the exposure to potentially deadly diseases. And tonight, there is new concern about a drug that is supposed to prevent malaria that's been given to thousands of soldiers in Iraq and Afghanistan. A CNN investigation with UPI reporters Mark Benjamin and Dan Olmsted has uncovered a series of suicides among a group of elite soldiers who took that drug.

Here is Mark Benjamin.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

MARK BENJAMIN, UPI REPORTER (voice-over): Army special forces soldiers are carefully selected and trained for mental stability. Bill Howell had excelled in difficult assignments around the globe for 10 years. But three weeks after his return from Iraq, his wife, Laura, says he snapped. In an uncontrollable rage, he beat her with his fists. Then he got his gun.

LAURA HOWELL, WIFE OF SOLDIER: I'm screaming at him to put the gun down. He still has a hold of me by the shoulder, by the collar of my shirt. And he's screaming, you're going to watch this, you're going to watch this. And he takes a couple of steps back. And I think that was the first time that he heard the police officers, because they're screaming at him, put it down, it's not worth it. Put the gun down. Put the gun down. And he kind of just -- oh -- noticed and took a step back and shot himself.

BENJAMIN: We found six special forces soldiers, including Bill Howell, who friends and family say had sudden deadly psychotic breaks. Among these are the only five special forces suicides since the U.S. entered Afghanistan and Iraq.

According to those who knew them, each of these soldiers had taken the anti-malaria medication called Lariam. The Food and Drug Administration warns Lariam, also called mefloquine, might cause mental problems, including rare instances of psychosis, aggression and suicide. The drug's manufacturer, Roche Pharmaceuticals, said there is no reliable scientific evidence linking Lariam and violent criminal behavior.

...

ZAHN: You talk very pointedly about the FDA's warnings about these drugs. The soldiers you talked to, how many of them had been warned about the social side effects of taking it?

BENJAMIN: I have talked with dozens and dozens of soldiers at eight bases in the United States and Europe. I have not met a soldier yet who's been warned about the possible side effects of this drug, despite FDA requirements to do so.

ZAHN: Why is that, Mark?

BENJAMIN: I don't know why the Army is not doing its job in warning these soldiers. But I do know there are a lot of soldiers who wish they had been warned.

ZAHN: Is there a suggestion of some kind of cover-up there? You also pointed out in this report that our government is responsible, actually, for manufacturing -- originally, I should say, creating this drug.

BENJAMIN: The Army did invent this drug in the 1970s to prevent malaria. I don't have any evidence that this is a cover-up. However, it is an extremely disturbing series of events. No question about it.

ZAHN: Well, there's another thing that caught my eye that I thought was disturbing. And that is the fact by law, the military is required to put into the medical records of soldiers when Lariam has been administered. That hasn't happened.

BENJAMIN: That's right.

ZAHN: Why?

BENJAMIN: Well, we don't know for sure. After the first Gulf War, Congress moved swiftly to make sure that if we may have caused some of Gulf War illness with anthrax shots or some other medicines, that doesn't happen again in terms of trying to figure out what happened.

In other words, Congress said, "Army, record everything in these medical records so we can go back and find out if we've done any damage to our soldiers."

The Army didn't do it. And once again, we're in a situation where we have, really, an unknown number of soldiers out there with potentially very serious health problems.

ZAHN: And how many of them may potentially be at risk?

BENJAMIN: We don't know for sure. We know that the latest prescription data from the Pentagon shows that at the end of October 2003, 45,000 service members had been given prescriptions for this drug up to that -- in that year ending in October 2003.

ZAHN: Just want to jump back to that other question of why this stuff wasn't recorded in medical records. Would someone be motivated to do that out of the desire to cover up something? Or is there just sloppiness at work?

BENJAMIN: I have no -- I have no evidence that it was nefarious conduct by the Army. But I wish they'd done better.

ZAHN: Mark Benjamin, thank you for bringing that report to us this evening.

And this note: we asked the Army for a response; got none.