Interestingly, after the war, a diverse group of military officers, physicians, and veterans organizations such as the American Legion campaigned for increased use of chemical weapons in future conflicts, vociferously arguing that they were more humane and less lethal than traditional armaments. Marked edema, with diphtheritic necrosis of the arytenoepiglottidean fold. Diphtheritic necrosis of pharynx, mucosa of larynx, and trachea. Mustard-gas lesions of tongue, pharynx, larynx, and trachea, in fatal human caseĭorsum of tongue shows diphtheritic eschars. 1 Inhalation oxygen therapy was used infrequently, improperly (at least in retrospect), and provided little benefit.įigure 3. Resorting to an ancient therapy, physicians bled patients, believing the phlebotomy would reduce the strain on the heart and help the body absorb secretions from the lungs. ![]() In an era before antibiotics, and in a population weakened by the exposure, malnutrition, and influenza so prevalent on 1918 battlefields, patients developed pneumonia and congestive heart failure and died. Gases caused severe edema and killed the cells lining the respiratory tract, leaving necrotic tissue to slough off and fill the lungs. The pulmonary effects of chemical warfare proved the most lethal (see Figure 3). Physicians did try using Dakin’s solution to wash off mustard gas residue but found petroleum equally effective and readily available on the battlefield. The literature proposed innumerable salves to ameliorate the skin burns caused by mustard gas, but none proved especially beneficial. Physicians prioritized minimizing exposure, keeping casualties warm, providing pain control, and allowing them rest. While extensive research delineated the pathophysiology of chemical weapons, therapeutic options remained few in number and largely ineffective. Army Medical Department Office of Medical History. Source: National Museum of Health and Medicine, Otis Historical Archives, OHA 342, Box 7 of U.S. When the men stripped to shower, medical officers examined their skin for evidence of gas exposure, triaging individuals who needed further care at specialized facilities (see Figure 2). 1 AMEDD also deployed mobile decontamination units, which could cleanse 24 men every three minutes. Once in Europe, AMEDD adopted the French “Z” system of evacuation, assigning one hospital per division to specialize in the care of chemical weapons victims (see Figure 1). 3,4 Although it was recognized that North American snails frantically waved their tentacles when exposed to gas, this technique did not prove to be a practical warning device. The Army also devised numerous detectors that variously alarmed, beeped, and changed color in the presence of poison gas. ultimately produced more than 5 million gas masks. invested in a massive research effort, eventually deploying the Kops-Tissot-Monroe mask that became standard issue. Initially forced to adopt British small-box respirators when early American gas masks proved ineffective, the U.S. 1,2 The CWS created an array of technologies to protect soldiers. Army Medical Department (AMEDD) created a Chemical Warfare Service (CWS) to develop protective equipment, which allowed its physicians to focus on treatment. did not enter World War I until 1917, it benefitted from the lessons learned by the French and British. Over the next three years, warring countries worked to develop multi-tiered responses to the threat of chemical weapons. ![]() While the German military offensive floundered, medically Ypres was a disaster for the British and French. The British had no gas masks, their physicians did not know how to treat gas-related casualties, and their hospital infrastructure was not equipped to handle the strain of thousands of new patients. In this first use of modern chemical warfare, all the advantages lay with the attacker. They released a rolling cloud that tumbled across “no man’s land” and into the unprepared trenches of the British Expeditionary Force defending the line at Ypres, France. ![]() Just before the sun began its slow descent below the horizon on April 22, 1915, thousands of German soldiers simultaneously twisted the knobs on metal cylinders containing chlorine gas.
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