Health aftermath of chemical tests on soldiers charted.

Tucked away in the labyrinthine National Academy of Sciences is the Medical Follow-up Agency. That agency is conducting a survey for another academy entity, the Board of Toxicology & Environment, which will interpret the data for the U.S. Army. Subject of the survey: the possible long-term health (actually, morbidity) effects of chemical agents used in a two-decade-long human testing program. From 1955 to 1975, the Army experimentally exposed nearly 7000 volunteers, all enlisted men, to a wide variety of chemical agents. The experiments were carried out at Aberdeen Proving Ground in Edgewood, Md., by the Biomedical Laboratory of the Chemical Corp. More than 250 chemicals were tested, and all have some military application. The Army ostensibly conducted this long-running testing program to develop defenses against the possible use of these agents. It remains puzzling, however, why some of the substances were tested, especially at the levels documented in Army records. The ongoing surveillance of the ...