NIH: no signs of brain injury in ailments of diplomats, spies
At odds with prior Havana syndrome studies
WASHINGTON — New studies by the National Institutes of Health failed to find evidence of brain injury in scans or blood markers of the diplomats and spies who suffered symptoms of Havana syndrome, bolstering the conclusions of US intelligence agencies about the strange health incidents.
Spy agencies have concluded that the debilitating symptoms associated with Havana syndrome, including dizziness and migraines, are not the work of a hostile foreign power. They have not identified a weapon or device that caused the injuries, and intelligence analysts now believe the symptoms are most likely explained by environmental factors, existing medical conditions, or stress.
The lead scientist on one of the two new studies said that while the study was not designed to find a cause, the findings were consistent with those determinations.
The authors said the studies are at odds with findings from researchers at the University of Pennsylvania, who found differences in brain scans of people with Havana syndrome symptoms and a control group
Dr. David Relman, a prominent scientist who has had access to the classified files involving the cases and representatives of people suffering from Havana syndrome, said the new studies were flawed. Many brain injuries are difficult to detect with scans or blood markers, he said. He added that the findings do not dispute that an external force, like a directed energy device, could have injured the current and former government workers.
The studies were published in The Journal of the American Medical Association on Monday alongside an editorial by Relman that was critical of the findings.
The incidents began to occur in greater concentrations at the end of 2016 and in 2017 in Havana and later in China, Austria, and elsewhere. The Biden administration took office in 2021 promising to improve health care for diplomats and spies suffering from the symptoms and vowing to get to the bottom of what was causing them.
Studies by the University of Pennsylvania in 2018 and 2019 suggested that people affected by the syndrome had possible brain injuries that were different from typical concussion injuries or other traumatic brain injuries.
The NIH studies looked at a different group of people, with less than one-third of the cases overlapping. Dr. Leighton Chan, the acting chief scientific officer for the NIH Clinical Center and the lead author of one of the studies, said that of the 86 participants, 24 cases were from Cuba,
six from China, 17 from Vienna, nine from around the United States, and 30 from other locations.
While examining the brain scans, the researchers found no significant differences with the control group.
In a news conference discussing the results before their public release, the NIH scientists said their scans, done in a research setting, were more precise than the scans produced primarily in clinical settings during earlier studies. They also said the control group was more closely matched to the study participants, improving the study’s rigor.
Researchers from the University of Pennsylvania said the two studies were “apples to oranges” comparisons because they looked at different groups of patients, and the NIH study was not designed to replicate theirs.
The NIH scientists said they did not diagnose the patients with traumatic brain injuries or concussions. The diagnoses they offered instead, all so-called “functional neurologic disorders,” are often caused by stress.
The studies did not rule out a potential external cause for Havana syndrome symptoms. But if one was not involved, Chan said, stress “may explain more of our findings.”
“It is important to note that individuals with functional neurological disorders of any cause have symptoms that are real, distressing, and very difficult to treat,” Chan said.