U.S. Reconfigures the Way Casualty Totals Are Given

February 2, 2007
U.S. Reconfigures the Way Casualty Totals Are Given

Statistics on a Pentagon Web site have been reorganized in a way that lowers the published totals of American nonfatal casualties in Iraq and Afghanistan.

On Monday, the bottom line of the Defense Department's Web page on casualties in Iraq listed a total of 47,657 "nonmortal casualties."

By Tuesday, the same page no longer showed a total for nonmortal casualties. The bottom line is now "total — medical air transported," and the figure is 31,493.

The new total excludes 16,164 troops who were wounded but did not require medical air transport because their injuries were minor. The total does include combat wounds, nonhostile injuries and diseases serious enough for medical transport.