S. Korea-based soldiers report malaria-protection issues

UIJEONGBU, South Korea

“Bill” didn’t want to see another soldier needlessly get sick.

He said he had spoken with a malaria-stricken soldier shortly after the 498th Combat Sustainment Support Battalion wrapped up training in July at Warrior Base’s Dagmar North, near the Demilitarized Zone.

The soldier said he nearly passed out from the chills, the nausea and the pounding in his head. At least three other soldiers in his battalion would follow with the symptoms, he said.

None were provided with repellent-treated uniforms or mosquito nets, nor had he seen anyone issued military-grade skin lotion to protect themselves in an area known for malaria-carrying mosquitoes, he said.

When Bill — a pseudonym used because the soldier fears command retribution — learned his unit was headed back to the area on Sept. 9, he asked his chain of command what they were doing differently to protect soldiers this time.

He said he was told not to worry about it.

“You can’t just yell at something like this and make it go away,” he said on Sept. 6. “We’re talking about soldiers’ health, maybe their lives.

“Who’s going to write the letter to a soldier’s mother saying we could have prevented your child from getting malaria, but we didn’t?”

Earlier that day, the South Korean Center for Disease Control issued a malaria alert for northern Gyeonggi province, which includes Warrior Base.

Bill’s company still had no permethrin, a mosquito treatment for uniforms. They didn’t have permethrin-treated bed nets. Neither he nor anyone he had seen had been issued military-grade DEET skin repellent. All of these items are called for in a 2003 U.S. Forces Korea regulation on field training from May through October.

When combined with a properly worn uniform, the recommended combination has a 99.94 percent protection rate against mosquito bites, according to military studies.

A Thursday statement from Army officials confirmed the unit didn’t have the gear for the July deployment.

During that training, “the unit leadership took all malaria preventive measures available to them,” according to the statement. “These measures included using DEET and spraying the field exercise area each night for insects.”

Finding protection

Worried about the soldiers’ safety, Bill called Stars and Stripes.

Stripes queried the 19th Sustainment Command (Expeditionary) on Sept. 7, asking what measures the 498th CSSB had taken to protect its soldiers.

“The health of our soldiers is of vital importance and we are taking every measure to ensure that they are safe,” 498th CSSB commander Lt. Col. Richard Hamilton wrote in an e-mail reply the same day. He said the unit had employed measures as outlined by USFK and medical officials, including wear of permethrin-treated uniforms.

By this time, multiple soldiers of varying ranks were in contact with Stripes and expressed surprise with Hamilton’s statement. Nobody in the soldiers’ companies had any permethrin or had used it at the time of Hamilton’s statement, they said. They were due to move to the field in 48 hours.

The next day, the soldiers were called to base and ordered to treat their uniforms. Soldiers told Stripes there was not enough for everyone and that some officers and senior noncommissioned officers went without to ensure the young troops were protected.

The command disputes those claims.

On Thursday, officials insisted that everyone had the opportunity to treat their uniforms with the permethrin that had been ordered in August.

Soldiers told Stripes that Hamilton addressed the battalion Sunday and told them within the first five minutes that he didn’t want them to get malaria. He asked if there was anyone who had not prepared themselves for mosquito-borne illnesses and that no one raised their hand at the battalion formation.

“Nobody would, no one ever would, because it would be out in front of the entire battalion,” Bill said. “He knows that.”

A few soldiers didn’t go to the training because they said they were allergic to permethrin, said 19th Sustainment Command pubic affairs officer Maj. LaTondra Anderson.

Anyone else who didn’t have the opportunity to treat his or her uniform could have said so at the formation, she added.

The soldiers treated the uniforms with the understanding that they would head to Dagmar North in about 24 hours, they said. On Saturday night, their deployment was delayed until Monday morning.

“They didn’t tell anybody why we were getting the permethrin [on Saturday],” another soldier said. “Some of the soldiers didn’t care, but a lot of them asked what it was. Others wanted to know about side effects — itching, burning.”

Mosquito netting

The battalion left Monday morning without any mosquito bed nets to protect them while they slept, and Stripes queried command officials the same day.

By Tuesday morning, mosquito nets hung over soldiers’ beds, they reported.

Hamilton told his leaders that he would fire them if he saw a soldier sleeping without a net, two of the soldiers told Stripes.

Officials attributed the late-arriving nets to their unavailability at their garrison. The nets were borrowed from U.S. Army Garrison Red Cloud, Anderson said.