SAN FRANCISCO — In a major setback for suffering combat veterans, a federal appeals court on Monday found that Congress, not the courts, is responsible for fixing the VA’s troubled mental health care system, overturning a previous court that found the program riddled with “unchecked incompetence.”
In a 10-1 decision, the 9th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals rejected a lawsuit that sought to force the Department of Veterans Affairs to overhaul the treatment program and reversed an earlier ruling that would have forced the government to speed up treatment requests and benefit claims.
Read the entire story here.
Showing posts with label VA. Show all posts
Showing posts with label VA. Show all posts
Tuesday, May 08, 2012
Saturday, August 13, 2011
No solace for family of soldier who took own life
Published: August 12, 2011
Every day now it seems there’s another bit of unfinished business in the life of Army veteran Jacob Andrews, who committed suicide in April.
A few days ago, it was a notice that the state of Missouri wants to collect the cost of a surgery Andrews had as a 10-year-old when he was on Medicaid. Last week, it was a notice from the U.S. Department of Veterans Affairs certifying---without mentioning his death---that Andrews was eligible for the post-9/11 GI Bill.
Between the two came another VA letter, this one in response to an inquiry from the office of U.S. Rep. Sam Graves (R-Mo.), denying responsibility for having erroneously told Andrews in November that he was ineligible for the GI Bill despite the year he spent fighting in Afghanistan.
Read the entire story here.
Monday, October 18, 2010
Wednesday, April 28, 2010
VA REFUSES TO TESTIFY AT HOUSE HEARING ON VETERANS' SUICIDES
VA will not produce Dr. Robert Petzel and Tammy Duckworth to testify at Oversight and Investigations Subcommittee hearing.
The press release below explains it all.
-------------------------
Congressman Harry E. Mitchell
Arizona’s Fifth Congressional District
NEWS RELEASE
April 26, 2010
FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
Mitchell Demands Accountability from VA
Ongoing Delays, Non-Compliance by the U.S. Department of Veterans Affairs Causes Hearing Postponement
WASHINGTON – Late last week, U.S. Rep. Harry Mitchell, Chairman of the Oversight and Investigations Subcommittee for the House Veterans Affairs Committee, announced the postponement of a hearing to examine VA outreach efforts to veterans at risk for suicide due to an emerging pattern of delays and non-compliance with subcommittee requests for witnesses and information by the Department of Veterans Affairs (VA).
"Many of our returning veterans and those who served in past generations bear wounds that can't be seen and are difficult to diagnose,” said Mitchell. “We can't wait for them to come to the VA. The VA needs to go to them, be held accountable for their action or inaction and be transparent with the progress of their efforts.”
The hearing, “Examining the Progress of Suicide Prevention Outreach Efforts at the U.S. Department of Veterans Affairs,” was scheduled for April 28, 2010. The hearing was to examine the progress of suicide prevention outreach efforts to veterans – many of whom are not being treated by the VA – who have committed or attempted suicide. The subcommittee had requested Undersecretary for Health, Dr. Robert Petzel, and Assistant Secretary for Public and Intergovernmental Affairs, L. Tammy Duckworth appear to testify, but the VA refused to produce them.
A new hearing date has not yet been set.
On Friday, Mitchell’s subcommittee notified the VA that the hearing would be postponed due to ongoing VA delays and non-compliance. Mitchell also wrote to VA Secretary Eric Shinseki urging the Secretary to comply with requests made by Mitchell’s Subcommittee and other members of Congress on issues critically important to veterans.
“Unfortunately this is not the first time I’ve expressed my concerns regarding requests going unanswered or unreasonably delayed. Additionally, as Chairman, I have received complaints from other Members of Congress that their requests for information from the Department are going unanswered or unreasonably delayed. Based on our Subcommittee’s recent experience with the Department, I am hardly in a position to dispute them,” Mitchell wrote.
As Chairman of the Veterans Affairs' Subcommittee on Oversight and Investigations, Mitchell has repeatedly called upon the VA to increase outreach to veterans who need mental health services and are at risk of suicide. Out of an estimated veteran population of 25 million veterans, only about 8 million veterans are enrolled for health care services through the VA. [Source: U.S. Census Bureau, October 16, 2008; Department of Veterans Affairs, April 17, 2009]
In the wake of an alarming epidemic of veterans committing suicide and months of pressure from Mitchell, he convinced the VA to reverse its long-standing self-imposed ban on television advertising and launch a nationwide public awareness campaign to inform veterans and their families about where they can turn for help. The first public service announcement, promoting a 1-800 telephone suicide prevention hotline, featured current CSI: New York and former Forrest Gump star Gary Sinise. [Source: CNN, May 12, 2009]
Mitchell has previously held numerous hearings on veteran suicides and mental health care, as well as suicide prevention and outreach. His efforts resulted in the VA’s reversal of its earlier policy prohibiting the use television media to reach out to service men and women who suffer from mental health disorders when returning from war. [Source: “VA to Test Public Service Ads,” CBS News, July 14, 2008]
The nationwide expansion of the VA’s public campaign has demonstrated success in saving lives. The hotline received over 160, 000 calls since its inception in 2007. Overall, more than 16,135 veterans were referred to VA medical facilities for care.
The press release below explains it all.
-------------------------
Congressman Harry E. Mitchell
Arizona’s Fifth Congressional District
NEWS RELEASE
April 26, 2010
FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
Mitchell Demands Accountability from VA
Ongoing Delays, Non-Compliance by the U.S. Department of Veterans Affairs Causes Hearing Postponement
WASHINGTON – Late last week, U.S. Rep. Harry Mitchell, Chairman of the Oversight and Investigations Subcommittee for the House Veterans Affairs Committee, announced the postponement of a hearing to examine VA outreach efforts to veterans at risk for suicide due to an emerging pattern of delays and non-compliance with subcommittee requests for witnesses and information by the Department of Veterans Affairs (VA).
"Many of our returning veterans and those who served in past generations bear wounds that can't be seen and are difficult to diagnose,” said Mitchell. “We can't wait for them to come to the VA. The VA needs to go to them, be held accountable for their action or inaction and be transparent with the progress of their efforts.”
The hearing, “Examining the Progress of Suicide Prevention Outreach Efforts at the U.S. Department of Veterans Affairs,” was scheduled for April 28, 2010. The hearing was to examine the progress of suicide prevention outreach efforts to veterans – many of whom are not being treated by the VA – who have committed or attempted suicide. The subcommittee had requested Undersecretary for Health, Dr. Robert Petzel, and Assistant Secretary for Public and Intergovernmental Affairs, L. Tammy Duckworth appear to testify, but the VA refused to produce them.
A new hearing date has not yet been set.
On Friday, Mitchell’s subcommittee notified the VA that the hearing would be postponed due to ongoing VA delays and non-compliance. Mitchell also wrote to VA Secretary Eric Shinseki urging the Secretary to comply with requests made by Mitchell’s Subcommittee and other members of Congress on issues critically important to veterans.
“Unfortunately this is not the first time I’ve expressed my concerns regarding requests going unanswered or unreasonably delayed. Additionally, as Chairman, I have received complaints from other Members of Congress that their requests for information from the Department are going unanswered or unreasonably delayed. Based on our Subcommittee’s recent experience with the Department, I am hardly in a position to dispute them,” Mitchell wrote.
As Chairman of the Veterans Affairs' Subcommittee on Oversight and Investigations, Mitchell has repeatedly called upon the VA to increase outreach to veterans who need mental health services and are at risk of suicide. Out of an estimated veteran population of 25 million veterans, only about 8 million veterans are enrolled for health care services through the VA. [Source: U.S. Census Bureau, October 16, 2008; Department of Veterans Affairs, April 17, 2009]
In the wake of an alarming epidemic of veterans committing suicide and months of pressure from Mitchell, he convinced the VA to reverse its long-standing self-imposed ban on television advertising and launch a nationwide public awareness campaign to inform veterans and their families about where they can turn for help. The first public service announcement, promoting a 1-800 telephone suicide prevention hotline, featured current CSI: New York and former Forrest Gump star Gary Sinise. [Source: CNN, May 12, 2009]
Mitchell has previously held numerous hearings on veteran suicides and mental health care, as well as suicide prevention and outreach. His efforts resulted in the VA’s reversal of its earlier policy prohibiting the use television media to reach out to service men and women who suffer from mental health disorders when returning from war. [Source: “VA to Test Public Service Ads,” CBS News, July 14, 2008]
The nationwide expansion of the VA’s public campaign has demonstrated success in saving lives. The hotline received over 160, 000 calls since its inception in 2007. Overall, more than 16,135 veterans were referred to VA medical facilities for care.
Thursday, October 09, 2008
Army Widow Sues U.S. Over Suicide
By Maryclaire Dale
The Associated PressPosted : Wednesday Oct 8, 2008 14:02:30 EDT
PHILADELPHIA — The widow of an Iraq war veteran who committed suicide while in outpatient care for depression at a Veterans Affairs hospital has sued the federal government for negligence.
Tiera Woodward, 26, claims in her lawsuit that her late husband, Donald, sought treatment at a VA hospital in Lebanon after three failed suicide attempts but wasn’t seen by a psychiatrist for more than two months.
She says doctors were slow to diagnose Donald with major depression. A psychiatrist diagnosed him Feb. 2, 2006, about a month before he died, the lawsuit states. But the psychiatrist failed to schedule a follow-up meeting with Donald after he informed the doctor he had gone off his medication.
Donald deployed to Iraq with the Army in March 2003 and saw five months of active combat. Upon his return, he got a job and enrolled in college, but by July 2005, his mother says, he had become “different, quiet and withdrawn.”
“I intend to make them make changes,” said Donald Woodward’s mother, Lori Woodward. “I have too many friends whose kids are in Iraq. I have a nephew now in Iraq, in the same unit, and I can’t have my family go through this again.”
Alison Aikele, a VA spokeswoman in Washington, D.C., said the agency does not typically comment on pending litigation.
Tiera Woodward filed the lawsuit only after the government failed to respond to her SF-95 form, a claim for death benefits that she filed Aug. 9, 2006. The claim was for $2 million.
The lawsuit seeks an unspecified amount of compensation for Donald Woodward's funeral and related expenses, loss of earnings and for pain and suffering.
It echoes other lawsuits nationwide over VA mental health services, despite legislation President Bush signed in November ordering improvements.
The family of Marine Jeffrey Lucey, also 23, has a federal suit pending in Massachusetts over his June 2004 suicide. And two veterans groups sued the VA in San Francisco seeking an overhaul of its health system, citing special concerns about mental health, but a judge dismissed the suit in June over venue issues.
More than 150,000 Iraq and Afghanistan war veterans have already sought mental health care from the VA, and another 200,000 have sought medical care, according to Veterans for Common Sense, veterans group that sued VA in San Francisco seeking an overhaul of its health system, citing special concerns about mental health. A judge dismissed the suit in June over venue issues.
“Each tragic veteran suicide is yet another painful reminder of the human cost of the Iraq and Afghanistan wars and VA’s abject failure to provide timely and appropriate mental health care,” said Paul Sullivan, the group’s executive director. “How many wake-up calls does VA need?”
http://www.armytimes.com/news/2008/10/ap_suicidesuit_100808/
--submitted by Patti W00dard
The Associated PressPosted : Wednesday Oct 8, 2008 14:02:30 EDT
PHILADELPHIA — The widow of an Iraq war veteran who committed suicide while in outpatient care for depression at a Veterans Affairs hospital has sued the federal government for negligence.
Tiera Woodward, 26, claims in her lawsuit that her late husband, Donald, sought treatment at a VA hospital in Lebanon after three failed suicide attempts but wasn’t seen by a psychiatrist for more than two months.
She says doctors were slow to diagnose Donald with major depression. A psychiatrist diagnosed him Feb. 2, 2006, about a month before he died, the lawsuit states. But the psychiatrist failed to schedule a follow-up meeting with Donald after he informed the doctor he had gone off his medication.
Donald deployed to Iraq with the Army in March 2003 and saw five months of active combat. Upon his return, he got a job and enrolled in college, but by July 2005, his mother says, he had become “different, quiet and withdrawn.”
“I intend to make them make changes,” said Donald Woodward’s mother, Lori Woodward. “I have too many friends whose kids are in Iraq. I have a nephew now in Iraq, in the same unit, and I can’t have my family go through this again.”
Alison Aikele, a VA spokeswoman in Washington, D.C., said the agency does not typically comment on pending litigation.
Tiera Woodward filed the lawsuit only after the government failed to respond to her SF-95 form, a claim for death benefits that she filed Aug. 9, 2006. The claim was for $2 million.
The lawsuit seeks an unspecified amount of compensation for Donald Woodward's funeral and related expenses, loss of earnings and for pain and suffering.
It echoes other lawsuits nationwide over VA mental health services, despite legislation President Bush signed in November ordering improvements.
The family of Marine Jeffrey Lucey, also 23, has a federal suit pending in Massachusetts over his June 2004 suicide. And two veterans groups sued the VA in San Francisco seeking an overhaul of its health system, citing special concerns about mental health, but a judge dismissed the suit in June over venue issues.
More than 150,000 Iraq and Afghanistan war veterans have already sought mental health care from the VA, and another 200,000 have sought medical care, according to Veterans for Common Sense, veterans group that sued VA in San Francisco seeking an overhaul of its health system, citing special concerns about mental health. A judge dismissed the suit in June over venue issues.
“Each tragic veteran suicide is yet another painful reminder of the human cost of the Iraq and Afghanistan wars and VA’s abject failure to provide timely and appropriate mental health care,” said Paul Sullivan, the group’s executive director. “How many wake-up calls does VA need?”
http://www.armytimes.com/news/2008/10/ap_suicidesuit_100808/
--submitted by Patti W00dard
Wednesday, April 23, 2008
VA Tried to Conceal Extent of Attempted Veteran Suicides, Email Shows
By Jason Leopold
(The Intelligence Daily) -- Top officials at the Veterans Administration tried to conceal information from the public about the sudden increase of attempted suicides among veterans that were treated or sought help at VA hospitals around the country, a previously undisclosed internal VA email indicates.
The email was disclosed Tuesday in a federal trial at a courthouse in Northern California where two veterans advocacy groups filed a class-action lawsuit against the VA alleging that a systematic breakdown at the VA has led to an epidemic of suicides among war veterans. These groups claim the VA has turned away veterans who have sought help for posttraumatic stress disorder and were suicidal. Some of the veterans, the lawsuit claims, later took their own lives.
The organizations who filed the lawsuit, Veterans for Common Sense and Veterans United for Truth, want a federal judge to issue a preliminary injunction to force the VA to immediately treat veterans who show signs of PTSD and are at risk of suicide and overhaul internal system that handles benefits claims. PTSD is said to be the most prevalent mental disorder arising from combat.
The Feb. 13., 2008, email, disclosed in federal court Tuesday, was sent to Ira Katz, the VA’s mental health director by Ev Chasen, the agency’s chief communications director.
Chasen sought guidance from Katz about interview queries from CBS News, which reported extensively on veterans suicides last year.
“Is the fact that we’re stopping [suicides] good news, or is the sheer number bad news? And is this more than we’ve ever seen before? It might be something we drop into a general release about our suicide prevention efforts, which (as you know far better than I) prominently include training employees to recognize the warning signs of suicide,” Chasen wrote Katz in an email titled "Not for CBS News Interview Request."
Katz’s response is startling. He said the VA has identified nearly 1,000 suicide attempts per month among war veterans treated by the VA. His response to Chasen indicates that he did not want the VA to immediately release any statistical data confirming that number, but rather suggested that the agency quietly slip the information into a news release.
“Shh!” Katz wrote in his response to Chasen. “Our suicide prevention coordinators are identifying about 1000 suicide attempts per month among the veterans we see in our medical facilities. Is this something we should (carefully) address ourselves in some sort of release before someone stumbles on it?”
The February email was sent shortly after the VA gave CBS News data that showed only a total of 790 attempted suicides in 2007 among veterans treated by the VA. In an email sent to the network Monday after Katz's email was disclosed in court, he denied a "cover-up" and said he did not disclose the true figures of attempted suicides because he was unsure if it was accurate.
In a December email Katz sent to Brig. Gen. Michael J. Kussman, the undersecretary for health at the Veterans Health Administration within the VA, that roughly 126 veterans of all wars commit suicide per week. He added that data the agency obtained from the Center for Disease Control showed that 20 percent of the suicides in the country are identified as war veterans.
The “VA’s own data demonstrate 4-5 suicides per day among those who receive care from us,” Katz said in the email he sent to Kussman.
Pehaps underscoring just how underprepared the VA was for the number of PTSD cases to emerge from the Iraq and Afghanistan wars, documents released to support the plaintiffs’ allegations show that prior to the U.S. Invasion of Iraq the VA believed it would likely see a maximum of 8,000 cases where veterans showed signs of PTSD.
Last week, the RAND Corporation released a study that said about 300,000 U.S. troops sent to combat in Iraq and Afghanistan are suffering from major depression or PTSD, and 320,000 received traumatic brain injuries. Since October 2001, about 1.6 million U.S. troops have deployed to the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan. Many soldiers have completed more than two tours of duty meaning they are exposed to prolonged periods of combat-related stress or traumatic events.
“There is a major health crisis facing those men and women who have served our nation in Iraq and Afghanistan," said Terri Tanielian, a researcher at RAND who worked on the study. “Unless they receive appropriate and effective care for these mental health conditions, there will be long-term consequences for them and for the nation. Unfortunately, we found there are many barriers preventing them from getting the high-quality treatment they need.”
Those are statistics Paul Sullivan, the executive director of Veterans for Common Sense, has been warning lawmakers about for several years.
“The scope of PTSD in the long term is enormous and must be taken seriously. When all of our 1.6 million service members eventually return home from Iraq and Afghanistan, based on the current rate of 20 percent, VA may face up 320,000 total new veterans diagnosed with PTSD,” Sullivan told a Congressional committee in July 2007. If America fails to act now and overhaul the broken DoD and VA disability systems, there may a social catastrophe among many of our returning Iraq and Afghanistan war veterans. That is why VCS reluctantly filed suit against VA in Federal Court...Time is running out”
Sullivan has urged Congress to enact legislation to immediately overhaul the VA.
“Congress should legislate a presumption of service connection for veterans diagnosed [with] PTSD who deployed to a war zone after 9/11,” Sullivan told lawmakers last year. “A presumption makes it easier for dedicated and hard-working VA employees to process veterans’ claims. This results in faster medical treatment and benefits for our veterans.”
Yet despite Sullivan’s dire predictions and calls for legislative action the issue has not been given priority treatment by lawmakers. Instead, Congress continued to fund the war in Iraq to the tune of about $200 billion and will likely pour another $108 billion into Iraq later next month.
Meanwhile, a backlog of veterans’ benefits claims continue to pile up at the VA.
The VA said it has hired more than 3,000 mental healthcare professionals over the past two years to deal with the increasing number of PTSD cases, but the problems persist.
VA Says Vets Not ‘Entitled’ to Healthcare
In opening statements Monday, Richard Lepley, a Justice Department attorney, said the VA runs a "world-class health care system."
But Gordon Erspamer, the lead attorney representing the two veterans groups, said the VA has arbitrarily denied coverage to thousands of vets, that it takes nearly a year to decide whether it will provide coverage to veterans suffering from PTSD, and takes as long as four years for the VA to address veterans appeals cases.
“Seeking help from the Department of Veterans’ Affairs... involves a two-track system,” says a copy of the plaintiff’s trial brief filed in federal court last week.“A veteran will go to the Veterans’ Health Administration for diagnosis and medical care; and a veteran goes to the Veterans’ Benefits Administration to apply for service-connection and disability compensation...
“VA is failing these veterans as they move along both of these parallel tracks. They are not receiving the healthcare to which they are entitled (and where they do receive it, it is unreasonably delayed) and they are not able to get timely compensation for their disabilities, which means that they have no safety net. These two problems combine to create a perfect storm for PTSD veterans: they receive no treatment, so their symptoms get worse; and they receive no compensation, so they cannot go elsewhere for treatment. The failings of these two separate but interrelated systems are what this action seeks to address.”
The lawsuit the groups filed alleges that numerous VA practices stemming from a 1998 law violate the constitutional and statutory rights of veterans suffering from PTSD by denying veterans mandated medical care.
Justice Department attorneys had argued in court papers filed last month that Iraq and Afghanistan veterans were not "entitled" to the five-years of free healthcare upon their return from combat as mandated by Congress in the "Dignity for Wounded Warriors Act." Rather, the VA argued, medical treatment for the war veterans was discretionary based on the level of funding available in the VA's budget.
But during a court hearing hearing last month before U.S. District Court Judge Samuel Conti, Dr. Gerald Cross, the Principal Deputy Under Secretary for Health, Veterans Health Administration, said that veterans of Iraq and Afghanistan were not only entitled to free healthcare, but he said "there is no co-pay."
Soldier’s Suicide Warnings Ignored
Chris Scheuerman, a retired Special Forces masters sergeant, testified before a Congressional committee last month that there is an urgent need for mental healthreform in the military.
Scheuerman said his son, Pfc. Jason Scheuerman, went to see an Army psychologist because he had been suicidal.
The Army psychologist wrote up a report saying Jason Scheuerman “was capable of (faking) mental illness in order to manipulate his command,” according to documents the soldiers father turned over to Congress.
“Jason desperately needed a second opinion after his encounter with the Army psychologist,” Chris Scheuerman testified in mid-March before the Armed Services Committee’s Military Personnel Subcommittee.
“The Army did offer him that option, but at his own expense. How is a PFC (private first class) in the middle of Iraq supposed to get to a civilian mental health care provider at his own expense?” he said. “I believe a soldier should be afforded the opportunity to a second opinion via teleconference with a civilian mental health care provider of their own choice.”
Jason Scheuerman shot himself with a rifle on July 30, 2005. The 20-year-old’s suicide note was nailed to the close in his barracks. It said, “Maybe now I can get some peace.”
Investigative journalist Jason Leopold is the author of the bestselling memoir, News Junkie. Visit http://www.newsjunkiebook.com/ for a preview.
--submitted by Lois Vanderbur
(The Intelligence Daily) -- Top officials at the Veterans Administration tried to conceal information from the public about the sudden increase of attempted suicides among veterans that were treated or sought help at VA hospitals around the country, a previously undisclosed internal VA email indicates.
The email was disclosed Tuesday in a federal trial at a courthouse in Northern California where two veterans advocacy groups filed a class-action lawsuit against the VA alleging that a systematic breakdown at the VA has led to an epidemic of suicides among war veterans. These groups claim the VA has turned away veterans who have sought help for posttraumatic stress disorder and were suicidal. Some of the veterans, the lawsuit claims, later took their own lives.
The organizations who filed the lawsuit, Veterans for Common Sense and Veterans United for Truth, want a federal judge to issue a preliminary injunction to force the VA to immediately treat veterans who show signs of PTSD and are at risk of suicide and overhaul internal system that handles benefits claims. PTSD is said to be the most prevalent mental disorder arising from combat.
The Feb. 13., 2008, email, disclosed in federal court Tuesday, was sent to Ira Katz, the VA’s mental health director by Ev Chasen, the agency’s chief communications director.
Chasen sought guidance from Katz about interview queries from CBS News, which reported extensively on veterans suicides last year.
“Is the fact that we’re stopping [suicides] good news, or is the sheer number bad news? And is this more than we’ve ever seen before? It might be something we drop into a general release about our suicide prevention efforts, which (as you know far better than I) prominently include training employees to recognize the warning signs of suicide,” Chasen wrote Katz in an email titled "Not for CBS News Interview Request."
Katz’s response is startling. He said the VA has identified nearly 1,000 suicide attempts per month among war veterans treated by the VA. His response to Chasen indicates that he did not want the VA to immediately release any statistical data confirming that number, but rather suggested that the agency quietly slip the information into a news release.
“Shh!” Katz wrote in his response to Chasen. “Our suicide prevention coordinators are identifying about 1000 suicide attempts per month among the veterans we see in our medical facilities. Is this something we should (carefully) address ourselves in some sort of release before someone stumbles on it?”
The February email was sent shortly after the VA gave CBS News data that showed only a total of 790 attempted suicides in 2007 among veterans treated by the VA. In an email sent to the network Monday after Katz's email was disclosed in court, he denied a "cover-up" and said he did not disclose the true figures of attempted suicides because he was unsure if it was accurate.
In a December email Katz sent to Brig. Gen. Michael J. Kussman, the undersecretary for health at the Veterans Health Administration within the VA, that roughly 126 veterans of all wars commit suicide per week. He added that data the agency obtained from the Center for Disease Control showed that 20 percent of the suicides in the country are identified as war veterans.
The “VA’s own data demonstrate 4-5 suicides per day among those who receive care from us,” Katz said in the email he sent to Kussman.
Pehaps underscoring just how underprepared the VA was for the number of PTSD cases to emerge from the Iraq and Afghanistan wars, documents released to support the plaintiffs’ allegations show that prior to the U.S. Invasion of Iraq the VA believed it would likely see a maximum of 8,000 cases where veterans showed signs of PTSD.
Last week, the RAND Corporation released a study that said about 300,000 U.S. troops sent to combat in Iraq and Afghanistan are suffering from major depression or PTSD, and 320,000 received traumatic brain injuries. Since October 2001, about 1.6 million U.S. troops have deployed to the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan. Many soldiers have completed more than two tours of duty meaning they are exposed to prolonged periods of combat-related stress or traumatic events.
“There is a major health crisis facing those men and women who have served our nation in Iraq and Afghanistan," said Terri Tanielian, a researcher at RAND who worked on the study. “Unless they receive appropriate and effective care for these mental health conditions, there will be long-term consequences for them and for the nation. Unfortunately, we found there are many barriers preventing them from getting the high-quality treatment they need.”
Those are statistics Paul Sullivan, the executive director of Veterans for Common Sense, has been warning lawmakers about for several years.
“The scope of PTSD in the long term is enormous and must be taken seriously. When all of our 1.6 million service members eventually return home from Iraq and Afghanistan, based on the current rate of 20 percent, VA may face up 320,000 total new veterans diagnosed with PTSD,” Sullivan told a Congressional committee in July 2007. If America fails to act now and overhaul the broken DoD and VA disability systems, there may a social catastrophe among many of our returning Iraq and Afghanistan war veterans. That is why VCS reluctantly filed suit against VA in Federal Court...Time is running out”
Sullivan has urged Congress to enact legislation to immediately overhaul the VA.
“Congress should legislate a presumption of service connection for veterans diagnosed [with] PTSD who deployed to a war zone after 9/11,” Sullivan told lawmakers last year. “A presumption makes it easier for dedicated and hard-working VA employees to process veterans’ claims. This results in faster medical treatment and benefits for our veterans.”
Yet despite Sullivan’s dire predictions and calls for legislative action the issue has not been given priority treatment by lawmakers. Instead, Congress continued to fund the war in Iraq to the tune of about $200 billion and will likely pour another $108 billion into Iraq later next month.
Meanwhile, a backlog of veterans’ benefits claims continue to pile up at the VA.
The VA said it has hired more than 3,000 mental healthcare professionals over the past two years to deal with the increasing number of PTSD cases, but the problems persist.
VA Says Vets Not ‘Entitled’ to Healthcare
In opening statements Monday, Richard Lepley, a Justice Department attorney, said the VA runs a "world-class health care system."
But Gordon Erspamer, the lead attorney representing the two veterans groups, said the VA has arbitrarily denied coverage to thousands of vets, that it takes nearly a year to decide whether it will provide coverage to veterans suffering from PTSD, and takes as long as four years for the VA to address veterans appeals cases.
“Seeking help from the Department of Veterans’ Affairs... involves a two-track system,” says a copy of the plaintiff’s trial brief filed in federal court last week.“A veteran will go to the Veterans’ Health Administration for diagnosis and medical care; and a veteran goes to the Veterans’ Benefits Administration to apply for service-connection and disability compensation...
“VA is failing these veterans as they move along both of these parallel tracks. They are not receiving the healthcare to which they are entitled (and where they do receive it, it is unreasonably delayed) and they are not able to get timely compensation for their disabilities, which means that they have no safety net. These two problems combine to create a perfect storm for PTSD veterans: they receive no treatment, so their symptoms get worse; and they receive no compensation, so they cannot go elsewhere for treatment. The failings of these two separate but interrelated systems are what this action seeks to address.”
The lawsuit the groups filed alleges that numerous VA practices stemming from a 1998 law violate the constitutional and statutory rights of veterans suffering from PTSD by denying veterans mandated medical care.
Justice Department attorneys had argued in court papers filed last month that Iraq and Afghanistan veterans were not "entitled" to the five-years of free healthcare upon their return from combat as mandated by Congress in the "Dignity for Wounded Warriors Act." Rather, the VA argued, medical treatment for the war veterans was discretionary based on the level of funding available in the VA's budget.
But during a court hearing hearing last month before U.S. District Court Judge Samuel Conti, Dr. Gerald Cross, the Principal Deputy Under Secretary for Health, Veterans Health Administration, said that veterans of Iraq and Afghanistan were not only entitled to free healthcare, but he said "there is no co-pay."
Soldier’s Suicide Warnings Ignored
Chris Scheuerman, a retired Special Forces masters sergeant, testified before a Congressional committee last month that there is an urgent need for mental healthreform in the military.
Scheuerman said his son, Pfc. Jason Scheuerman, went to see an Army psychologist because he had been suicidal.
The Army psychologist wrote up a report saying Jason Scheuerman “was capable of (faking) mental illness in order to manipulate his command,” according to documents the soldiers father turned over to Congress.
“Jason desperately needed a second opinion after his encounter with the Army psychologist,” Chris Scheuerman testified in mid-March before the Armed Services Committee’s Military Personnel Subcommittee.
“The Army did offer him that option, but at his own expense. How is a PFC (private first class) in the middle of Iraq supposed to get to a civilian mental health care provider at his own expense?” he said. “I believe a soldier should be afforded the opportunity to a second opinion via teleconference with a civilian mental health care provider of their own choice.”
Jason Scheuerman shot himself with a rifle on July 30, 2005. The 20-year-old’s suicide note was nailed to the close in his barracks. It said, “Maybe now I can get some peace.”
Investigative journalist Jason Leopold is the author of the bestselling memoir, News Junkie. Visit http://www.newsjunkiebook.com/ for a preview.
--submitted by Lois Vanderbur
Saturday, December 15, 2007
Data sought on veterans' suicide
By KIMBERLY HEFLING, Associated Press Writer Thu Dec 13, 2:27 AM ET
WASHINGTON - The parents of an Iraq war veteran who committed suicide and members of Congress on Wednesday questioned why there's not a comprehensive tracking system of suicide among Iraq and Afghanistan veterans.
Mike Bowman, of Forreston, Ill., said his son, Spc. Timothy Bowman, 23, is a member of the "unknown fallen" not counted in statistics. His son, a member of the Illinois National Guard, took his own life in 2005 eight months after returning from war. Bowman said he considers his son a "KBA" — killed because of action.
"If the veteran suicide rate is not classified as an epidemic that needs immediate and drastic attention, then the American fighting soldier needs someone in Washington who thinks it is," Bowman said.
Bowman was one of several witnesses who testified before the House Veterans' Affairs Committee on the issue.
Rep. Bob Filner, the committee chairman, questioned why the comprehensive tracking wasn't already being done.
"They don't want to know this, it looks to me," said Filner, D-Calif. "This could be tracked."
Dr. Ira Katz, the VA's deputy chief patient care service officer for mental health at the Department of Veterans Affairs, defended the work being done by his agency to tackle the issue, including implementing a suicide prevention hotline.
"We have a major suicide prevention program, the most comprehensive in the nation," Katz said. Katz questioned why Filner was focusing on the number of suicides instead of looking at treatment programs implemented to help prevent suicide.
Awareness of suicide among Iraq and Afghanistan veterans was heightened earlier this year when the Army said its suicide rate in 2006 rose to 17.3 per 100,000 troops — the highest level in 26 years of record-keeping.
The Department of Veterans Affairs tracks the number of Iraq and Afghanistan veterans who commit suicide, but only if they have been discharged from the military.
The Pentagon tracks the number of suicides in Iraq and Afghanistan. For an earlier story, a Pentagon spokeswoman told The Associated Press the military does not keep track of whether active duty troops who took who took their own lives served in Iraq or Afghanistan.
In an e-mail on Wednesday, the same spokeswoman, Cynthia Smith, said, "We track all suicides, I just don't have combat service information readily available."
At least 152 troops have committed suicide in Iraq and Afghanistan, according to the Defense Manpower Data Center, which tracks casualties for the Pentagon.
On Oct. 31, the AP reported that preliminary research from the Department of Veterans Affairs had found that from the start of the war in Afghanistan on Oct. 7, 2001, and the end of 2005, 283 troops who served in the wars who had been discharged from the military had committed suicide. On Wednesday, Katz said the VA's number had been changed to 144 because some of the veterans counted were actually in the active military and not discharged on the day they committed suicide.
Smith said that the military's suicide rate is still lower than that of the general population.
After leaving the military, however, veterans appear to be at greater risk for suicide than those who didn't serve. Earlier this year, researchers at Portland State University in Oregon found male veterans were twice as likely to commit suicide as their civilian counterparts.
In a report last May, the VA Inspector General said VA officials estimate 1,000 suicides per year among veterans receiving care within the agency and as many as 5,000 per year among all veterans.
"When decision makers do no have reliable data, we must rely on anecdotal evidence," said Rep. Steve Buyer, R-Ind. "While these may help inform us, it does not help us to develop strategies
to diminish the risk and prevent incidents of suicide."
----------------------------------
Editor's note: I listened to this contentious hearing and noticed that the suicide rate among female soldiers in Iraq and Afghanistan was actually higher than that of the civilian population. For me, there was an 800 pound gorilla in the room which neither the House Veteran's Affairs Committee members nor the VA spokespeople could not, or would not bring up. That was the fact that not all suicides are actually suicides in the military. Some are homicides. This can skew any statistical analysis to the point where it is meaningless.
The military does not do CSI-type investigations in these cases. Families are lucky if any serious investigation at all is done. We have family members in our group who have had to do their own investigations. Some of the "suicides" are obviously homicides. See http://non-combat-death.org for Our Loved Ones' Stories.
I'm guessing that some "suicides" are politically expedient. Some homicides are covered up because if the public knew that soldiers were murdering one another the recruiting rate would go down even more.
I wish the Congress and the VA would drop the dance and get down to the heart of the question.
Is an undeclared war, started on a false premise demoralizing?
Do repeated, frequent deployments add to the stress that may cause actual suicide?
Are soldiers, especially female soldiers, being murdered and the murders covered up as suicide?
Braveheart
WASHINGTON - The parents of an Iraq war veteran who committed suicide and members of Congress on Wednesday questioned why there's not a comprehensive tracking system of suicide among Iraq and Afghanistan veterans.
Mike Bowman, of Forreston, Ill., said his son, Spc. Timothy Bowman, 23, is a member of the "unknown fallen" not counted in statistics. His son, a member of the Illinois National Guard, took his own life in 2005 eight months after returning from war. Bowman said he considers his son a "KBA" — killed because of action.
"If the veteran suicide rate is not classified as an epidemic that needs immediate and drastic attention, then the American fighting soldier needs someone in Washington who thinks it is," Bowman said.
Bowman was one of several witnesses who testified before the House Veterans' Affairs Committee on the issue.
Rep. Bob Filner, the committee chairman, questioned why the comprehensive tracking wasn't already being done.
"They don't want to know this, it looks to me," said Filner, D-Calif. "This could be tracked."
Dr. Ira Katz, the VA's deputy chief patient care service officer for mental health at the Department of Veterans Affairs, defended the work being done by his agency to tackle the issue, including implementing a suicide prevention hotline.
"We have a major suicide prevention program, the most comprehensive in the nation," Katz said. Katz questioned why Filner was focusing on the number of suicides instead of looking at treatment programs implemented to help prevent suicide.
Awareness of suicide among Iraq and Afghanistan veterans was heightened earlier this year when the Army said its suicide rate in 2006 rose to 17.3 per 100,000 troops — the highest level in 26 years of record-keeping.
The Department of Veterans Affairs tracks the number of Iraq and Afghanistan veterans who commit suicide, but only if they have been discharged from the military.
The Pentagon tracks the number of suicides in Iraq and Afghanistan. For an earlier story, a Pentagon spokeswoman told The Associated Press the military does not keep track of whether active duty troops who took who took their own lives served in Iraq or Afghanistan.
In an e-mail on Wednesday, the same spokeswoman, Cynthia Smith, said, "We track all suicides, I just don't have combat service information readily available."
At least 152 troops have committed suicide in Iraq and Afghanistan, according to the Defense Manpower Data Center, which tracks casualties for the Pentagon.
On Oct. 31, the AP reported that preliminary research from the Department of Veterans Affairs had found that from the start of the war in Afghanistan on Oct. 7, 2001, and the end of 2005, 283 troops who served in the wars who had been discharged from the military had committed suicide. On Wednesday, Katz said the VA's number had been changed to 144 because some of the veterans counted were actually in the active military and not discharged on the day they committed suicide.
Smith said that the military's suicide rate is still lower than that of the general population.
After leaving the military, however, veterans appear to be at greater risk for suicide than those who didn't serve. Earlier this year, researchers at Portland State University in Oregon found male veterans were twice as likely to commit suicide as their civilian counterparts.
In a report last May, the VA Inspector General said VA officials estimate 1,000 suicides per year among veterans receiving care within the agency and as many as 5,000 per year among all veterans.
"When decision makers do no have reliable data, we must rely on anecdotal evidence," said Rep. Steve Buyer, R-Ind. "While these may help inform us, it does not help us to develop strategies
to diminish the risk and prevent incidents of suicide."
----------------------------------
Editor's note: I listened to this contentious hearing and noticed that the suicide rate among female soldiers in Iraq and Afghanistan was actually higher than that of the civilian population. For me, there was an 800 pound gorilla in the room which neither the House Veteran's Affairs Committee members nor the VA spokespeople could not, or would not bring up. That was the fact that not all suicides are actually suicides in the military. Some are homicides. This can skew any statistical analysis to the point where it is meaningless.
The military does not do CSI-type investigations in these cases. Families are lucky if any serious investigation at all is done. We have family members in our group who have had to do their own investigations. Some of the "suicides" are obviously homicides. See http://non-combat-death.org for Our Loved Ones' Stories.
I'm guessing that some "suicides" are politically expedient. Some homicides are covered up because if the public knew that soldiers were murdering one another the recruiting rate would go down even more.
I wish the Congress and the VA would drop the dance and get down to the heart of the question.
Is an undeclared war, started on a false premise demoralizing?
Do repeated, frequent deployments add to the stress that may cause actual suicide?
Are soldiers, especially female soldiers, being murdered and the murders covered up as suicide?
Braveheart
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)