Heavily Reliant on Reserves

Air Force Reserve Command provides some 80 percent of the Air Force’s vaunted aeromedical evacuation capability, declared Lt. Gen. James Roudebush, Air Force Surgeon General, Wednesday at an Air Force seminar on Capitol Hill. He added that, in 2005 and 2006, AFRC had sent more than 890 medical personnel and the Air National Guard another 258 or so to the Southwest Asia theater of operations. Those reserve forces contributed greatly to the Defense Department’s all time low 7.2 percent died-of-wounds rate. Roudebush credited all military medics with participating in that tremendous success story and a new low disease non-battle injury rate. He also proudly pointed out that it now takes a short three days to transport a wounded soldier back home, which “greatly helps in the recovery.”