11/03/2004

Iraq wounds = ACW wounds

Interesting:
Curiously, the pattern of wounds in the Iraq war -- 58 percent to the arms and legs -- resembles the pattern seen in the Civil War, but for radically different reasons. Medical records of the Union Army show that 71 percent of the wounds in soldiers who survived to get medical treatment were to the limbs. Confederate records estimate the percentage as 65 percent. Nearly a half-million men were permanently disabled by wounds in that war, which led to great advances in orthopedic surgery and the design of prosthetic limbs. In the Civil War, however, the chief reason was that almost nobody survived a wound to the torso. About 94 percent of Union soldiers killed in action died of head, neck, chest or abdominal wounds. Most wounded survivors had injuries to the limbs.