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Journalist Julia Ioffe just said this in a Puck News article:

Meanwhile, the number of government employees suffering from Havana Syndrome has jumped from a couple dozen to a couple hundred. Some reports place the figure of affected government employees as high as 300. I’ve heard from several sources that the Walter Reed Military Medical Center, where some of those affected have been going for treatment, is overwhelmed to the point of no longer being able to take new patients. The government is now outsourcing these victims to non-government hospitals.

Also as a tweet from the same journalist:

There are now so many cases of Havana Syndrome that Walter Reed is at capacity. The U.S. government has started outsourcing cases to other hospitals

For those who don’t know, Havana Syndrome is a weird set of symptoms that US government officials stationed overseas have been getting the past few years. Some people think it’s psychosomatic in origin, others think it’s due to energy-weapon attacks by a hostile foreign power like Russia.

But my question is, is it true that Walter Reed Military Medical Center is getting so many Havana Syndrome patients that it is not able to handle them all?

Laurel
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Keshav Srinivasan
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    I initially doubted whether a source called "Puck" was notable, but I see they're a deep-pocketed (and paywalled) service that started publishing in August. Julie Ioffe is a former Atlantic writer with solid credentials. However, this claim may fall into the current affairs hole; the only other information about the claim will rely on further reporting. – jeffronicus Oct 20 '21 at 22:57
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    Is the claim that the hospital is overwhelmed and not taking new patients in general (e.g., perhaps being hit hard by COVID-19?), or specifically overwhelmed and not taking new patients with Havana Syndrome? – Nat Oct 21 '21 at 00:10
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    @Nat hmm... this reminds me of the "hospitals are full of ivermectin overdoses" claim from just a few weeks ago... – Avery Oct 21 '21 at 01:19
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    @jeffronicus: Just a reminder that notable doesn't mean veracious. It isn't the credentials of the author, it is how widely it is believed (or, as a proxy, read). – Oddthinking Oct 21 '21 at 03:25
  • @Avery: too bad that got deleted by the poster before it got answered. – Fizz Oct 21 '21 at 05:58
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    @Nat: I thought that too, but based on her tweet she clearly seems to mean they are overwhelmed mainly from Havana alone. – Fizz Oct 21 '21 at 13:46
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    Walter Reed is huge. Unless every one of these 300 people is in the ICU, it doesn't seem very likely that there's a capacity issue. I'm not sure if there's any source that's useful as patients have the reasonable expectation of privacy. – CJR Oct 22 '21 at 01:31
  • Not an answer, but see https://www.skeptic.com/reading_room/havana-syndrome-skepticism-it-was-probably-psychogenic-by-robert-bartholomew/ – hdhondt Oct 22 '21 at 09:05
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    CNN reports ""We are particularly concerned that some State Department employees with such symptoms who have been recommended for treatment have been refused access to Walter Reed National Medical Military Care Center by the Department of State, despite their requests to be seen at Walter Reed." ... is it WRMC or the State Department denying the care? – CGCampbell Oct 22 '21 at 13:08

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