Background: Chemical warfare agents (CWA) were most notably used during the First World War in Europe, against Iranians and Kurdish citizens of Iraq at the hands of Saddam Hossein’s regime in 1980s and more recently in Syria. The use of CWA is banned under the international law. Methods: Ancient uses of CWA are not well studied. Recently, their use during the Persian siege of the Roman-held Dur...

Recent events including the Sept. 11, 2001 attacks in New York, Washington, DC, and Pennsylvania have illustrated the vulnerability of the United States to terrorist activity. Many experts agree that a chemical or biological event is likely to occur within the continental United States during our lifetime. The anesthesiologist, as well as, emergency medicine provider and critical care specialis...

I am pleased that the two articles on Airport Remediation following a Chemical Terrorist Attack are being published in the Journal of Human and Ecological Risk Assessment since that will make them available to a larger audience and facilitate updating. Agency guideline reports tend to be shelved and forgotten and the two articles in this report should avoid that fate since they are much more th...

To the Editor:—The interesting article by Flaishon et al. included prospective data on the difficulties of performing anesthetic and critical care duties in mass casualty situations. An additional factor to consider is the challenge of continuing to perform one’s duties while wearing full antichemical protective gear. As a member of the Air National Guard, I am obligated to perform chemical war...

Percutaneous exposure to the chemical warfare nerve agent VX was evaluated in African green monkeys (n=9). Doses of VX (7.5-100 μg/kg) were applied to the skin for 60 min and residual agent was quantified (before decontamination) to estimate the absorbed dose. Monkeys were evaluated for the presence or absence of clinical signs of toxicity and blood was sampled periodically (30 min--12 weeks) f...