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The Institute of Medicine (IOM) announced Friday,July 24th, there is a possible connection between exposure to Agent Orange and both Parkinson’s Disease and Ischemic Heart Disease. In a similar report issued in 2006, the IOM determined a connection between Agent Orange exposure and Hypertension. The VA has yet to acknowledge this link and make Hypertension a presumptive illness.
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The Institute of Medicine (IOM) announced Friday there is a possible connection between exposure to Agent Orange and both Parkinson’s Disease and Ischemic Heart Disease. In a similar report issued in 2006, the IOM determined a similar connection between Agent Orange exposure and Hypertension. The VA has yet to acknowledge this link and make Hypertension a presumptive illness.
As a presumptive illness, all the veteran who suffers from the condition needs to do is establish he served in Vietnam between 1962 and 1975. There are other areas where Agent Orange was used where the presumptive illness rules apply Korea near the DMZ is one.
Since the IOM has established at least an increase in occurrence of these conditions in veterans who served in Vietnam, why then is there no presumption of service connection for veterans afflicted with these conditions?
Quite simply the answer is MONEY! The Secretary of the VA cannot afford to grant presumptive status for these conditions. It would destroy his budget. The large increase in health care services within the VA budget would be wiped out immediately!
This is the problem. While we all agree that our veterans deserve the best of health care from the VA, Congress has not and apparently will not consider fully funding the VA. Their failure to do so creates a system that is dependent upon a budget that has been below needs almost every year for at least a decade. Last year’s budget was $3 billion short.
A document prepared in June of 2005 by the Democratic staff of the House Veterans’ Affairs Committee a snapshot of what shortfalls in the budget do to care for our veterans.
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- Fifty percent of all the veterans receiving home health care through the San Antonio VAMC will now have to fend for themselves. This cost-cutting measure means that some 250 veterans, including those with spinal cord injuries, will no longer be provided this care.
- Veterans in need of outpatient psychiatric treatment at the Portland facility are on a waiting list because of the budget shortfall.
- As a result of cost cutting measures to make up for the shortfall in FY 2005, the Portland, Oregon, VAMC is delaying all non-emergent surgery by at least six months. For example, veterans in need of knee replacement surgery won’t be treated because of the budget shortfall.
Cut like this would be commonplace if the presumptions for Parkinson’s, Ischemic Heart Disease and hypertension were granted. The solution is to fully fund the VA Health Care system. Let the administrators of all VA facilities know that they are to provide the veterans with Quality health care at all times. This is in direct conflict with the current policies of delaying or refusing to treat veterans because of budget constraints.
Congress does not appear to want to provide full funding. When given the option of full funding and advanced appropriations they chose advanced appropriations. Advanced appropriations will not fix the VA budget! Only full funding will. We as veterans must unite in an effort to convince the Congress and the President that the VA must be fully funded.
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