A five year, $75 million contract to research Gulf War Syndrome has been pulled from the University of Texas Southwestern over allegations of “persistent noncompliance and numerous performance deficiencies”.
The US Department of Veterans Affairs, which commissions research studies on medical issues of relevance to military personnel, has ended the five year contract after just two years.
Gerald Cross, the VA’s Acting Under Secretary for Health, said research on the conditions that afflict Gulf War veterans “remains a priority” but that the department “must make certain that our resources are used to support effective and productive research”.
UT issued a statement expressing surprise at the cancellation and said it strongly disagrees with the Veterans Affair’s take on the matter.
“We thought we were in some productive discussions with them,” Tim Doke, a university spokesman, told the Dallas Morning News. “I don’t know that we see this as an endpoint, but as another of a long series of disagreements with them.”
Doke adds that the cancellation of the VA contract could jeopardise the research of Robert Haley, an epidemiologist who has linked the mysterious diseases afflicting Gulf War veterans to exposure to chemicals in the war. The VA says evidence for what caused illness in nearly a quarter of those who served is still unclear.
Texas Senator Kay Bailey Hutchison, who added the money for the contract to a 2005 spending bill, had harsh words for the VA.
“Southwestern has worked to comply with all the VA’s contractual demands but the VA bureaucracy apparently did not reciprocate in good faith,” says Hutchinson (AP). “The biggest losers are the thousands of affected Gulf War veterans who have fought the VA for years to recognize their illness as real.”
A recent report from the VA’s Office of Inspector General accused the university’s Medical Center at Dallas breaking the terms of the contract, failing to bill appropriately, and unilaterally changing an informed consent form for medical research.
“Given UTSWMC’s continued refusal to comply with the terms and conditions of the contract, UTSWMC has given VA no option other than to terminate the contract for default,” stated the report. “Although such action is extreme, allowing UTSWMC to violate a critical requirement in the contract sets a precedent that the terms and conditions of VA contracts are discretionary, not mandatory.”
Image: US military during Operation Desert Storm / DoD