UPI Poll: One-quarter know Iraq casualties

WASHINGTON, Sept. 13 (UPI) -- Nearly one-quarter of those who took part in a UPI-Zogby International poll said they know someone killed or wounded in the war in Iraq.

The U.S. service personnel death toll of the war is approaching 3,800 while the number of wounded is more than 20,000. With some 130,000 U.S. personnel serving in Iraq, and the rotation of units making Iraq war veterans of many more, it is easy to imagine that a large percentage of Americans know someone who has gone to Iraq.

Indeed, 71.2 percent of the 7,081 U.S. residents asked in a Zogby interactive poll said they knew someone who served in Iraq.

Some 75.2 percent of respondents from the Central and Great Lakes regions and 74.2 percent of those participants from the South said they knew someone who served in Iraq. However, 70.3 percent of respondents from the West and 62.9 percent of those from the East said the same.

A total of 23.2 percent of the entire pool said they knew someone killed or injured in Iraq, with 33.9 percent of the Rural pool subset saying they knew a casualty of the Iraq war.

The poll, carried out Sept. 7-10, has a margin of error of 1.2 percentage points.