Gulf War syndrome

Abstract

From September 1990 to June 1991, the UK deployed 53,462 military personnel to the Gulf War. In 1993 reports began to surface in the UK about unexplained health problems occurring among Gulf War veterans. Unlike other research into this illness, this work focuses on sufferers' own accounts to better understand the way the illness is perceived by those it affects. Based on 14 months of ethnographic fieldwork in the UK, data for this contribution were collected mainly by in-depth semi-structured interviews with Gulf War syndrome sufferers, their family members, doctors and scientists. This contribution focuses on the way an anthropological inquiry can help us to move beyond traditional thinking that forces such illnesses into either psychiatric or physical categories. By introducing social, cultural, economic and historic features, an anthropological account enables Gulf War syndrome to be seen in context. In this way, Gulf War syndrome can be seen as an expression, both social and personal, of the life experiences of those it affects. Although the illness shares many characteristics with other new illness movements, Gulf War syndrome is a unique condition with distinctive features. Veterans' accounts of their condition focus on its contagious nature and on issues of masculinity.