Public Radio For Eastern North Carolina 89.3 WTEB New Bern 88.5 WZNB New Bern 91.5 WBJD Atlantic Beach 90.3 WKNS Kinston 88.5 WHYC Swan Quarter 89.9 W210CF Greenville
Play Live Radio
Next Up:
0:00
0:00
0:00 0:00
Available On Air Stations

Gulf War Illness study at ECU to continue into 2015

 
Audio File

A Defense Department funded study of Gulf War Illness being conducted at East Carolina University will continue into 2015.
Edit | Remove

The $1.1 million study was scheduled to end this year but will continue through 2015. Forty veterans from the Carolinas and Virginia who developed Gulf War Illness have participated in the study. Dr. William Meggs, a medical toxicologist and professor of emergency medicine at the Brody School of Medicine at ECU who is the study leader, hopes to recruit another 20 veterans to participate. The research is looking at the effectiveness of generic drugs that control inflammation in the brain that may have been
triggered by neurotoxin exposures. Gulf War veterans were exposed to many neurotoxins, including nerve gas from Scud missiles and from the demolition of ammunition dumps containing sarin. I’m George Olsen.

George Olsen is a 1977 Havelock High School graduate. He received his B.A. in Broadcast Journalism from the University of South Carolina in 1982 where he got his first taste of non-commercial radio working for their student station WUSC. After graduation he worked about five years in commercial radio before coming to work at Public Radio East where he has remained since outside of a nearly 3-year stint as jazz and operations coordinator at WUAL in Tuscaloosa, Alabama in the early 1990s. On his return to eastern North Carolina he hosted classical music for Public Radio East before moving into the Morning Edition host position and now can be heard on All Things Considered. He also hosts and produces The Sound, five hours of Americana, Roots Rock and Contemporary Folk weekday evenings on PRE Public Radio East News & Ideas, and is a news and feature producer for Public Radio East.