Editorial: Enough with Congressional Reports, Time for Action is Here

From the Clarksville [TN] Leaf-Chronicle:

It's been established beyond doubt that the outpatient care that many injured troops and veterans are receiving is severely lacking. The attention now needs to be centered on how to make it better. ...

Among the charges is that the health care system is too difficult to navigate. Those who were injured in war complain of long waits for proper treatment — if it ever comes at all — and differing ratings on disabilities once they change from military hospitals to the VA system. On that latter point, during Senate hearings, members heard testimony that the Army is more likely than the other services to rate a disability at less than 30 percent. That's the cutoff for whether service members and their families get lifetime health benefits.

Retired Army Lt. Gen. James Terry Scott, chairman of the Veterans Disability Benefits Commission, testified there are various legitimate factors as to why the Army may rate below 30 percent. But he also said at the Senate hearing there obviously is incentive to keep soldiers at the lower rating "so only separation pay is required and continuing family care is not."

Scott's commission was formed in 2004 to study ways to improve the benefits system. It will be issuing a formal report later in the year. How much longer will our soldiers and veterans have to wait for action? The pressure is now on Congress and the Department of Defense to turn the situation around and ensure that everyone who needs a high degree of care actually receives it.

I couldn't agree more.

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Considerable Quotes

"The first shamans earned their keep in primitave societies by providing explanations and rituals that enabled man to deal with his environment and his personal anguish. Early man, no less than we, dealt with forces that he could not understand or control, and he attempted to come to grips with his vulnerablity by trying to bring order to his universe." -- Richard Gabriel in No More Heroes

"War stories end when the battle is over or when the soldier comes home. In real life, there are no moments amid smoldering hilltops for tranquil introspection. When the war is over, you pick up your gear, walk down the hill and back into the world." -- OIF vet John Crawford in The Last True Story I'll Ever Tell

"After wars' end, soldiers once again become civilians and return to their families to try to pick up where they left off. It is this process of readjustment that has more often than not been ignored by society. -- Major Robert H. Stretch, Ph.D in Textbook of Military Medicine: Vol. 6 Combat Stress

Sunday, April 15, 2007

Editorial: Enough with Congressional Reports, Time for Action is Here

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