The Most Serious Risk To Our Solders In Iraq Are…Non-Combat Injuries?

Like high blood pressure. Not to mention bad backs and bum knees.

CAMP VICTORY, Iraq — High blood pressure, bad backs, bum knees and other mundane health problems put three and a half times more troops on planes to hospitals in Germany or the United States than do snipers and roadside bombs, say front-line experts in Iraq .
“There’s nothing about being deployed or being in an austere environment that protects you from the normal maladies that people encounter in the United States ,” said Lt. Col. Ron Ross , a preventive medicine officer with the U.S. Army’s 62nd Medical Brigade in Iraq .

The folks at McClatchy Newspapers are the same people who brought you that heart-breaking story about Iraqi grave diggers put out of work by all the peacefulness in their country.