The Residual Effects of Warfare Gases ...
Author : Harry Lorenzo Gilchrist
Publisher :
Page : 108 pages
File Size : 25,12 MB
Release : 1933
Category : Chlorine
ISBN :
Veterans at Risk
Author : Institute of Medicine
Publisher : National Academies Press
Page : 448 pages
File Size : 33,31 MB
Release : 1993-02-01
Category : Medical
ISBN : 030904832X
Book Description
Recently, World War II veterans have come forward to claim compensation for health effects they say were caused by their participation in chemical warfare experiments. In response, the Veterans Administration asked the Institute of Medicine to study the issue. Based on a literature review and personal testimony from more than 250 affected veterans, this new volume discusses in detail the development and chemistry of mustard agents and Lewisite followed by interesting and informative discussions about these substances and their possible connection to a range of health problems, from cancer to reproductive disorders. The volume also offers an often chilling historical examination of the use of volunteers in chemical warfare experiments by the U.S. militaryâ€"what the then-young soldiers were told prior to the experiments, how they were "encouraged" to remain in the program, and how they were treated afterward. This comprehensive and controversial book will be of importance to policymakers and legislators, military and civilian planners, officials at the Department of Veterans Affairs, military historians, and researchers.
Death by Mustard Gas
Author : Geoff Plunkett
Publisher :
Page : 256 pages
File Size : 43,62 MB
Release : 2014-10-10
Category : Chemical agents (Munitions)
ISBN : 9781922132918
Book Description
In 1943 a top secret consignment of chemical weapons, includingdeadly mustard gas, arrived in Australia by ship. But there wasa problem -- it was leaking. Military authorities quickly realisedthis but, in the interests of secrecy, sent unprotected andunsuspecting wharf labourers into a lethal environment. The resultwas catastrophic: permanent disability and death. This shockingnarrative includes accounts of official deceit, intimidation ofgassed labourers and denial of natural justice. The truth, buriedin classified documents and the testimony of the few survivors, isthat human life was sacrificed for the sake of secrecy.Almost 70 years after war stocks of chemical weapons wereapparently totally destroyed, mustard gas is still present on theAustralian mainland, in her oceans and along her coastal fringes.The total destruction of chemical stocks is simply anothermilitary assumption. The truth is that these deadly weapons wereincompletely destroyed, buried or simply lost. Many retain theireffectiveness despite the passing of time, a fact that cost oneman his life and saw staff and children at a school badly burned.Mustard gas weapons have been retrieved as recently as 2012and more may lie in shallow graves waiting to be
Dew of Death
Author : Joel A. Vilensky
Publisher : Indiana University Press
Page : 241 pages
File Size : 16,94 MB
Release : 2005-09-07
Category : History
ISBN : 0253111528
Book Description
"Dr. Vilensky raises important concerns regarding the threats posed by lewisite and other weapons of mass destruction. As he describes, non-proliferation programs are a vital component in the War on Terror." -- Richard G. Lugar, United States Senator "Joel Vilensky's book is a detailed and immensely useful account of the development and history of one of the major chemical weapons.... We will always know how to make lewisite, the 'Dew of Death,' but that does not mean that we should, or be compelled to accept such weapons in our lives." -- from the Foreword by Richard Butler, former head of UN Special Commission to Disarm Iraq In 1919, when the Great War was over, the New York Times reported on a new chemical weapon with "the fragrance of geranium blossoms," a poison gas that was "the climax of this country's achievements in the lethal arts." The name of this substance was lewisite and this is its story -- the story of an American weapon of mass destruction. Discovered by accident by a graduate student and priest in a chemistry laboratory at the Catholic University of America in Washington, D.C., lewisite was developed into a weapon by Winford Lewis, who became its namesake, working with a team led by James Conant, later president of Harvard and head of government oversight for the U.S.'s atomic bomb program, the Manhattan Project. After a powerful German counterattack in the spring of 1918, the government began frantic production of lewisite in hopes of delivering 3,000 tons of the stuff to be ready for use in Europe the following year. The end of war came just as the first shipment was being prepared. It was dumped into the sea, but not forgotten. Joel A. Vilensky tells the intriguing story of the discovery and development of lewisite and its curious history. During World War II, the United States produced more than 20,000 tons of lewisite, testing it on soldiers and secretly dropping it from airplanes. In the end, the substance was abandoned as a weapon because it was too unstable under most combat conditions. But a weapon once discovered never disappears. It was used by Japan in Manchuria and by Iraq in its war with Iran. The Soviet Union was once a major manufacturer. Strangely enough, although it was developed for lethal purposes, lewisite led to an effective treatment for a rare neurological disease.
Medical Defense Against Mustard Gas
Author : Alan J. Feister
Publisher : CRC Press
Page : 390 pages
File Size : 17,35 MB
Release : 1991-04-03
Category : Medical
ISBN : 9780849342578
Book Description
This book provides a comprehensive review and analysis of the acute toxic effects of sulfur mustard (mustard gas); the injuries that this compound produces in skin, eye, airway, and other tissues; and possibilities for the prevention of these injuries through pharmacological intervention. The book takes a multidisciplinary approach and is intended for all biomedical researchers interested in combatting the effects of chemical weapons, as well as those who have a general interest in the basic processes underlying cell death and tissue injury. Drawing on an extensive base of scientific literature, including many government research reports that are difficult or impossible for most researchers to obtain, the book covers the pathological features of acute mustard injury, sulfur mustard's toxicodynamics, its chemistry, its molecular and cellular mechanisms of injury, the inflammatory mechanisms involved in injury, prophylactic and therapeutic approaches to prevention of injury, and experimental models of mustard injury.
The Great Secret: The Classified World War II Disaster that Launched the War on Cancer
Author : Jennet Conant
Publisher : W. W. Norton & Company
Page : 400 pages
File Size : 13,26 MB
Release : 2020-09-08
Category : History
ISBN : 1324002514
Book Description
The gripping story of a chemical weapons catastrophe, the cover-up, and how one American Army doctor’s discovery led to the development of the first drug to combat cancer, known today as chemotherapy. On the night of December 2, 1943, the Luftwaffe bombed a critical Allied port in Bari, Italy, sinking seventeen ships and killing over a thousand servicemen and hundreds of civilians. Caught in the surprise air raid was the John Harvey, an American Liberty ship carrying a top-secret cargo of 2,000 mustard bombs to be used in retaliation if the Germans resorted to gas warfare. When one young sailor after another began suddenly dying of mysterious symptoms, Lieutenant Colonel Stewart Alexander, a doctor and chemical weapons expert, was dispatched to investigate. He quickly diagnosed mustard gas exposure, but was overruled by British officials determined to cover up the presence of poison gas in the devastating naval disaster, which the press dubbed "little Pearl Harbor." Prime Minister Winston Churchill and General Dwight D. Eisenhower acted in concert to suppress the truth, insisting the censorship was necessitated by military security. Alexander defied British port officials and heroically persevered in his investigation. His final report on the Bari casualties was immediately classified, but not before his breakthrough observations about the toxic effects of mustard on white blood cells caught the attention of Colonel Cornelius P. Rhoads—a pioneering physician and research scientist as brilliant as he was arrogant and self-destructive—who recognized that the poison was both a killer and a cure, and ushered in a new era of cancer research led by the Sloan Kettering Institute. Meanwhile, the Bari incident remained cloaked in military secrecy, resulting in lost records, misinformation, and considerable confusion about how a deadly chemical weapon came to be tamed for medical use. Deeply researched and beautifully written, The Great Secret is the remarkable story of how horrific tragedy gave birth to medical triumph.
Handbook of Toxicology of Chemical Warfare Agents
Author : Ramesh C Gupta
Publisher : Academic Press
Page : 1182 pages
File Size : 21,84 MB
Release : 2009-04-02
Category : Medical
ISBN : 0080922732
Book Description
This groundbreaking book covers every aspect of deadly toxic chemicals used as weapons of mass destruction and employed in conflicts, warfare and terrorism. Including findings from experimental as well as clinical studies, this one-of-a-kind handbook is prepared in a very user- friendly format that can easily be followed by students, teachers and researchers, as well as lay people. Stand-alone chapters on individual chemicals and major topics allow the reader to easily access required information without searching through the entire book.This is the first book that offers in-depth coverage of individual toxicants, target organ toxicity, major incidents, toxic effects in humans, animals and wildlife, biosensors, biomarkers, on-site and laboratory analytical methods, decontamination and detoxification procedures, prophylactic, therapeutic and countermeasures, and the role of homeland security. - Presents a comprehensive look at all aspects of chemical warfare toxicology in one reference work. This saves researchers time in quickly accessing the very latest definitive details on toxicity of specific agents used in chemical warfare as opposed to searching through thousands of journal articles. Will include the most agent-specific information on the market - Includes detailed coverage of the most exhaustive list of agents possibly used as chemical warfare agents in one source. Section 4: Agents That Can Be Used as Weapons of Mass Destruction ? 25 chapters long. Other books on the market only include a sample selection of specific agents. Offering all possible agents detailed under one cover makes this appealing to a wider audience and saves researchers time - The Forward will be written by Dr. Tetsuo Satoh, Chiba University, Japan. He is one of the most respected, recognizable authorities on chemical warfare agents which will set the authoritative tone for the book - Covers risk to humans, animals and the environment equally. Researchers involved in assessing the risks involved with a possible chemical warfare attack and those who are developing response plans to such attacks must look at not only the risks to human health but to our wildlife and environment as well. The holistic approach taken in this book ensures that the researchers have ready access to the details no matter which aspect of the effects of CWA's they might be concerned with
War of Nerves
Author : Jonathan Tucker
Publisher : Anchor
Page : 476 pages
File Size : 25,8 MB
Release : 2007-12-18
Category : History
ISBN : 0307430103
Book Description
In this important and revelatory book, Jonathan Tucker, a leading expert on chemical and biological weapons, chronicles the lethal history of chemical warfare from World War I to the present. At the turn of the twentieth century, the rise of synthetic chemistry made the large-scale use of toxic chemicals on the battlefield both feasible and cheap. Tucker explores the long debate over the military utility and morality of chemical warfare, from the first chlorine gas attack at Ypres in 1915 to Hitler’s reluctance to use nerve agents (he believed, incorrectly, that the U.S. could retaliate in kind) to Saddam Hussein’s gassing of his own people, and concludes with the emergent threat of chemical terrorism. Moving beyond history to the twenty-first century, War of Nerves makes clear that we are at a crossroads that could lead either to the further spread of these weapons or to their ultimate abolition.
The Poisonous Cloud
Author : L. F. Haber
Publisher : Oxford University Press
Page : 430 pages
File Size : 29,73 MB
Release : 1986-02-20
Category : History
ISBN : 0191512311
Book Description
The author examines fully the military role of chemical warfare and its effects on the people, industries, and administrations on both sides; he also considers the growing moral problems it created. The launching of an entirely new weapon that did not discriminate between soldiers and civilians raised complex issues which were debated endlessly between the wars and which, in recent years, have led to agreement among the powers not to use chemical or biological warfare.
Mustard Lung
Author : Mostafa Ghanei
Publisher : Academic Press
Page : 164 pages
File Size : 34,76 MB
Release : 2016-05-03
Category : Medical
ISBN : 0128039795
Book Description
Mustard Lung: Diagnosis and Treatment of Respiratory Disorders in Sulfur-Mustard Injured Patients brings together the details regarding pathophysiology, medication, and protective issues to provide a comprehensive look at health problems associated with sulfur mustard injury. It provides a bench-to-bedside look at the long term complications of vesicant exposure in humans as well as how mustard gas exposure affects lung function. By providing guidelines and approaches for the diagnosis, pathogenesis, and treatment of SM injury cases, this book is helpful for a wide range of medical researchers and clinicians. For decades, chemical respiratory disorders were diagnosed and managed traditionally similar to other chronic respiratory diseases. However, the exact nature of chemical respiratory disorders is different and needs to be treated as such. - Includes the most up-to-date basic and clinical research findings on sulfur mustard from top researchers - Provides information on chemical agents, complications that arise due to sulfur mustard exposure, and drugs available to treat injuries - Contains an appendix with practical prescription recommendations for patients affected by mustard lung - Provides a bench-to-bedside look at the long term complications of vesicant exposure in humans as well as how mustard gas exposure affects lung function
