Top 10 Veterans Stories in Today’s News

From the VA:

Top 10 Veterans Stories in Today’s News

1.      Military Installation, Hospital Receive Funding To Assist Homeless Vets. The Seattle, Washington-based Puget Sound Business Journal (7/23) reports, “Joint Base Lewis-McChord in Pierce County will receive $2 million and the American Lake Veterans Hospital in Tacoma will receive $1 million as part” of a “$15 million federal funding effort” by the US Department of Housing and Urban Development and the US Department of Veterans Affairs to assist homeless vets. According to a press release accompanying the Business Journal coverage, VA Secretary Eric Shinseki commented on the Veterans Homelessness Prevention Demonstration Program funding, stating, “Nowhere is our obligation to our citizens, and to our Veterans who have defended our Nation, more important, more visible, or more necessary than in our commitment to prevent and end homelessness.”

 2.      White House Says Obama Will Speak At Disabled Veterans Convention. The Air Force Times (7/23, Maze) reports, “President Obama will speak Aug. 2 in Atlanta at the national convention of Disabled America Veterans, an election-year appearance where he will point to a long list of accomplishments made by his administration in improving veterans’ programs, White House officials said Thursday.” According to the Times, DAV, “one of the nation’s biggest veterans groups,” has “worked closely with the administration on many issues, but it remains critical of difficulties facing veterans who are trying to receive benefits and treatment for service-connected disabilities.”

3.      California Trying To Fund Veterans Outreach Plan. The Sacramento (CA) Bee (7/22, Sanders) reported, “State officials in cash-strapped California are trying to find the money to locate hundreds of thousands of military veterans who could be missing out on benefits.” After noting that the California Department of Veterans Affairs “currently has contact information for only about 20,000 of the state’s 2 million veterans,” the Bee added, “Locating the others and connecting them with veterans benefits could bring hundreds of millions in new federal funds annually to help bolster the economy.” The California Legislature, however, has proposed cutting Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger’s plan to increase the budget for the state’s veterans service officers, who would be in charge of finding the missing vets.

4.      Research Supported By VHA Investigates New Way To Treat Sickle Cell Disease. Science Daily (7/23) reports, “A University of Minnesota Medical School research team…has discovered that cannibinoids offer a novel approach to ease the chronic and acute pain caused by sickle cell disease (SCD).” After noting that cannabinoids is a “synthetic compound based on marijuana derivatives,” Science Daily Points out the research “was supported by National Institutes of Health and by the Veterans Health Administration.” Science Daily also says that right now, opiods are the “only approved treatment for management of severe pain in SCD.”

5.      VA Creates New Registry For Soldiers Exposed To Hexavalent Chromium In Iraq. The Oregonian (7/23, Sullivan).

 6.      VA Hospital To Host Women Vets Forum. The Jackson (MS) Clarion-Ledger (7/23) notes that on Friday, “from 11 a.m. to 12:30 p.m.,” the G.V. “Sonny” Montgomery Veterans Affairs Medical Center “will host a round table discussion for Women Veterans.” The forum, to be held in Montgomery Hall at the hospital, “will include panel discussions on topics such as eligibility, post-deployment health services and vet center benefits.”

7.      War Bill Passed By Senate Has Money For Agent Orange-Exposed Vets. In continuing coverage, the AP (7/23) reports, “The Senate passed a $60 billion bill to fund President Barack Obama’s troop surge in Afghanistan Thursday night,” after “rejecting more than $20 billion in domestic spending the House had tacked on. In a take-it-or-leave-it gesture,” the Senate “returned to the House a measure limited chiefly to war funding, foreign aid, medical care for Vietnam War veterans exposed to Agent Orange, and replenishing almost empty disaster aid accounts. The moves repel a long-shot bid by House Democrats earlier this month to resurrect their faltering jobs agenda” with, among other things, “$10 billion in grants to school districts to avoid teacher layoffs.”
     Bloomberg News (7/23, Faler) notes that about “half of the measure passed by the Senate would pay for the troop surge in Afghanistan,” while another “$13.4 billion would pay for an expansion of the number of ailments presumed to be tied to use of the defoliant Agent Orange during the Vietnam War. Another $5 billion would go to disaster relief.”
     House Expected To Bring Bill With Agent Orange-Related Funding To Floor Next Week. A CQ (7/23, Lesniewski, Symes) story on plans for next week in both the House and Senate, says the House is “expected to bring the first two fiscal 2011 appropriations bills to the floor – the Transportation-HUD and the Military Construction-VA spending bills.” The Military Construction-VA legislation “includes increased funding for the Department of Veterans Affairs, in part to help pay for new medical claims from thousands of Vietnam War veterans exposed to the defoliant Agent Orange.”
     Clinton Vows To Increase Agent Orange Cooperation With Vietnam. AFP (7/23) notes that during a Thursday visit to Vietnam, United States Secretary of State Hillary Clinton “vowed to increase cooperation in dealing with the legacy of the wartime herbicide Agent Orange,” which contains dioxin, a toxic chemical. AFP adds, “Experts have identified three former US air bases as ‘hot spots’ of dioxin contamination, but decontaminating all three of them would cost an estimated 59 million dollars, most of which still needs to be committed, a United Nations adviser in Hanoi said last month.”
     Clinton’s Agent Orange comments are also noted by Reuters (7/22), the New York Times (7/23, A8, Landler), the Washington Post (7/23, DeYoung), the Wall Street Journal (7/23, Solomon), and NPR (7/22, Northam), during its “Morning Edition” program

8.      Higher Education Leaders Concerned About Proposed Changes To New GI Bill. Publishing a story from the Inside Higher Ed (7/22, Stripling) website, USA Today (7/23) notes that during a hearing Wednesday in Washington, DC, US senators “grappled with legislation that would attempt to simplify the often-dizzying formula for calculating veterans’ benefits under the Post-9/11 GI Bill. But proposed legislation to simplify the process could wind up reducing benefits for some of those attending private colleges, higher education leaders argue.” After pointing out that under the current version of the Post-9/11 GI Bill, the maximum benefit is based “on the highest tuition of any public program in a given state,” while under the proposed S. 3447, the “new cap would be derived from the average tuition and fees of all private and public baccalaureate programs across the nation,” Inside Higher Ed added, “That baseline would be around $12,000, meaning veterans at private colleges would receive less funding in almost half of states, according to the American Council on Education.”
     VA Education Chief Says Department Will Implement Change In Bill’s Stipend Rates By End Of July. Military.com (7/23, Howell) reports, “This week the Chief of VA Education Programs, Keith Wilson, told the Senate Committee for Veteran’s Affairs that…VA will fully implement the 2010 monthly living stipend rates” for the Post-9/11 GI Bill by the end of this month. According to Military.com, the “change in payment rate is about 7 months overdue — a delay caused by…VA’s antiquated payment systems.”
     Wilson: VA Working To Improve Processing Of New GI Bill Benefits. The Army News Service (7/22, Fogle) notes, “The Department of Veterans Affairs is working to improve processing veterans benefits under the Post-9/11 GI Bill, a VA official told senators” this week. While testifying “before the Senate Committee on Veteran’s Affairs,” Keith Wilson, director of the VA Education Service Department, “said productivity and policies are two areas in which the department is making improvements. ‘We will do whatever it takes to make sure individuals are paid their benefits,’ Wilson said.”

 9.      VA Official Doubts New PTSD Rules Will Lead To Fraud. In continuing coverage, “News Buzz” for Milwaukee Magazine (7/23, Hrodey) reports, “New federal rules issued last week will make it much easier for veterans to claim treatment” for post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD). And, while “some officials believe the…rules will also lead to fraudulent — and potentially expensive — claims of PTSD by some veterans,” Wisconsin VA Regional Office Director Robert Granstrom, “says he doesn’t think fraud under the new system is very likely. He says claims are still reviewed even though the process has been shortened dramatically.”
     Outreach Worker: PTSD Claims Will Go Through System “Much Quicker.” The KJBR-TV Duluth, MN (7/22, Jacobsen) website said that for “troops fighting on the front lines of Iraq and Afghanistan, the real battle sometimes begins in earnest when they’ve made it home.” Now, however, “red tape has been removed from benefits helping troops suffering PTSD get on the road to recovery more quickly. ‘They’ll find their claims will go through much quicker,’ said John Hall, an outreach worker with…VA,” who added, “The advocates will be able to move their claims along quite a bit quicker and come to a more positive resolution.”
     More Soldiers Being Discharged From US Army With Mental Disorder. USA Today (7/23, Zoroya) reports, “The number of soldiers forced to leave the Army solely because of a mental disorder has increased by 64% from 2005 to 2009 and accounts for one in nine medical discharges, according to…statistics” provided by the US Army. USA Today adds, “The trend matches other recent indicators that show a growing emotional toll on a military that has been fighting for seven years in Iraq and nine years in Afghanistan, the Army and veterans advocates say.”
     Senate Urged To Approve Screening Legislation For Members Of Individual Ready Reserve. In an editorial, the New York Times (7/23, A22) says legislation mandating psychological and physical examinations for combat vets belonging to the “Army’s Individual Ready Reserve – a category that does not enjoy the unit-based care of other reservists – is again on the Congressional agenda.” After noting that US Rep. Rush Holt (D-NJ) said the measure was struck last year for budgetary reasons, the Times argues, “Considering the two wars” currently being fought by the US were “declared and waged with scant attention to their full costs, lawmakers add insult to injury by invoking budget concerns for the traumatic needs of actual warriors. The provision, approved again by the House in the defense authorization bill, deserves final approval in the Senate.”

 10.    VA Continues To Test Vets Potentially Infected With HIV At Hospital In St. Louis. In continuing coverage, the “Federal Eye” blog for the Washington Post (7/23, O’Keefe) reports, “The Department of Veterans Affairs continues to test more than 1,800 military veterans potentially infected with HIV, hepatitis B and hepatitis C,” while undergoing dental procedures at the John Cochran VA Medical Center in St. Louis. The Post continues, “VA had tested 1,144 veterans as of Wednesday and 809 had tested negative for HIV, hepatitis B and hepatitis C, according to a spokeswoman,” who added that results are pending for the other veterans. According to the Post, the “latest exposure scare comes after the VA exposed more than 10,000 military veterans to the diseases at hospitals in Florida, Georgia and Tennessee.”