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Gulf War illness and Mitochondrial Impairment…
Is There a Connection?

Posted by James on 04/30/2017 | Comment

We recently received an email from a customer that led us to ask; Is Mitochondrial Impairment the cause of many of the symptoms of Gulf War illness and could the SAME products we supply to mitochondrial patients worldwide in 2014 possibly help veterans of the 1990-91 Persian Gulf War still suffering from Gulf War illness?

Before we go any further, here is a verbatim copy of the email we received:

“Hello, I just wanted to thank you for your MitoTonic product and let you know that I started to take it for my Gulf-War Illness related symptoms (CFS, Fibro & IBS), after learning about Dr. Golomb's recent research highlighted in the article below. MitoTonic has helped greatly to restore/normalize my energy levels. I don't know if your company has considered adding “Gulf War Illness or Gulf War Syndrome” to your list of product placement search terms but I think it could be of great benefit to veterans that are suffering with this. I had been on D-Ribose for years to try to combat my fatigue but it had lost it's effectiveness over time and obviously I was missing the other important ingredients for the mitos that your product tastefully incorporates. Thank you again.”

Here is the link to the article (study) that our customer sent us regarding the study that found problems in Gulf War vets' cell function:

http://www.militarytimes.com/article/20140408/NEWS/304080065/Small-study-finds-problem-Gulf-War-vets-cell-function.

The Basic Findings and Our Thoughts on CoQ10 and Gulf War Syndrome:

Researchers at the University of California-San Diego School of Medicine discovered that the mitochondria in veterans with Gulf War illness don’t function as well as mitochondria in unaffected individuals. They did this by testing recovery time of muscles at the cellular level following exercise. Affected Gulf War veterans “displayed significantly delayed recovery.”

IMPORTANT CAUTION: The study was very small — just 7 veterans with Gulf War illness and 7 controls. However, researcher Dr. Beatrice Golomb described the difference in results as “visibly striking,” with “a large average difference as statistically significant.” This mitochondrial impairment could account for many of the symptoms of Gulf War Illness.

Dr. Golomb went on to say “the classic presentation for mitochondrial illness involves multiple symptoms spanning many domains, similar to what we see in Gulf War illness. These classically include fatigue, cognitive and other brain-related challenges, muscle problems and exercise intolerance, with neurological and gastrointestinal problems also common”. Dr. Golomb believes the evidence could explain why CoQ10 helped relieve some of the symptoms of Gulf War illness in another study she conducted.

The researchers would like to see further validation via study replication and additional research, possibly using different mitochondrial assessment tools. But as the UC-San Diego public affairs staff noted, the study does imply that “Gulf War illness is not in veterans’ heads, but in their mitochondria.” If true, then many of the SAME bio-enhanced CoQ10 products we currently supply to mitochondrial patients could help some Persian Gulf War Veterans still suffering from Gulf War illness / Gulf War Syndrome.