VA needs to inform veterans
Carl Young/My Word/The Times-Standard
Posted: 12/04/2008 01:30:47 AM PST



Too many veterans are unaware of the benefits and services that are available to them.

Many of those veterans have health issues and need medical care. Others may be eligible for benefits, but they don't know how to go about getting them.

The sad fact is, there are millions of veterans who have little, or no, medical insurance and are paying for care that our Department of Veterans Affairs should be offering them for little or no cost.

There are veterans in America today that are suffering from illnesses directly related to their service who are not aware there is help out there.

Needless to say, this is a national disgrace. The VA has established a listing of “presumptive illnesses or disabilities” that provide a direct link to where and when a veteran served. The problem is getting that word out.

For example, the majority of “in-country” Vietnam veterans who have survived prostate cancer, or have died, had no clue that it was related to their service. The reasons that information like this doesn't get to veterans are as varied as the cancers that are now recognized by the VA.

The bottom line is, the VA is doing a crappy job of informing veterans of their rights, even though they are required to do so by law!

Veterans dating back to World War II have been identified as being higher risk groups for all forms of leukemia (with the exception of chronic lymphocytic leukemia). Cancers of the thyroid, breast,

pharynx, esophagus, stomach, small intestine, pancreas, bile ducts, gall bladder, salivary gland, urinary tract, brain, bone, lung, colon and ovaries are recognized as service-connected.
Bronchiolo-alveola carcinoma, multiple myelomas, lymphomas, and primary liver cancer (with the exception of cirrhosis or hepatitis B is indicated) are also on the list.

Veterans who served in the Southwest Asia Theater of Operations during the Gulf War have been showing signs of medically unexplained chronic multi-symptom illnesses defined by a cluster of signs or symptoms that have existed for six months or more. The signs are chronic fatigue syndrome, fibromyalgia, irritable bowel syndrome, and any undiagnosed illness that the secretary of Veterans Affairs determines warrants a presumptive of service connection. All of the mentioned have at least a 10 percent rating.

How many veterans are aware that within one year of their release from active duty, those chronic diseases (such as arthritis, diabetes, or hypertension) can be linked to their time in the military?

How many veterans know that if they spent 90 days or more active duty, and were diagnosed with amyotophic lateral sclerosis (ALS -- Lou Gehrig's disease), they may have it because of time they spent in the military?

When I hear the old refrain from the VA that they do not have the resources to inform our veterans of these options for treatment and help, my blood boils. There is absolutely no reason that the VA can't work more closely with the traditional media such as television, radio, and newspapers to get this important information out to the vast veteran population in our country.

In this new age, all avenues should be explored to get the word out. The VA should work the Web to provide easy-access blogs that give medical updates, and a more friendly service approach than the traditional VA Web site which is like navigating through a maze.

I support the good things the VA does, such as the recently implemented Veterans Suicide Hotline. For the record, that hotline was in response to the orders of the federal court to inform veterans of their options and to help them regardless of where they were in the country.

Without information, veterans have no hope when they become ill and wonder where to turn. Getting information to them is a matter of life and death. Especially, if a veteran dies and his/her family are left paying crushing private medical bills that should have been handled by the VA.

Despite talk of caring for veterans, the VA is not walking the walk when it comes to informing them of their rights and medical benefits. VA clinics nationally need to step up and have handouts available (where they can be easily seen) for veterans whose lives may depend upon the knowledge in them.

By not making more of an effort than it is to get this valuable information out to all veterans, the VA is failing in its mission to us. Men and women who have served their country honorably are now being dishonored by this lack of attention to something so vital.

The theme of the 75th anniversary of the VA was to outreach to every living veteran to inform them of what services were available to them. Veterans are still waiting for that grand claim to come true. Let's not make them wait another 75 years before action is actually taken.

For further information, contact the Humboldt County Veterans Service office at 445-7341, the VA at 1-800-827-1000 or the VA's Web page, http://www.vba.va.gov/VBA/benefits/f...umpeg_0307.doc.


Carl Young is the spokesman and member of the executive board for

the Humboldt Memorial Chapter of Vietnam Veterans of America. He resides in Fortuna.



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