Copyright 2004 and Seattle Times Co
By Michael J. Berens
Seattle Times staff reporter

... Patterson's death and its swift closure is an example of broad, deep-rooted health-care problems inside the nation's boot camps, a Seattle Times investigation found.

At a time when the Iraq war puts each recruit in high demand, at least 1 in 9 are treated for acute pneumonia, adenovirus or other respiratory diseases during their short but intense training stints, according to a Times analysis of military records.

Infection rates at boot camps have risen each of the past five years — often to epidemic levels, military medical-surveillance records show. Today, military boot-camp barracks dwarf nursing homes, dormitories and all other close-quarter ins utional settings for the number and ferocity of such outbreaks.

Up to 3,000 recruits each month are treated for acute respiratory illnesses, which flourish in overcrowded barracks where beds are stacked head-to-toe with stressed and fatigued troops.

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Seattle Times

All this and Pre-emptive War! Hubert Hoover would be proud.