WHAT'S WRONG WITH VETERAN HEALTHCARE?

WHERE THE PROBLEM STARTED

There have been issues with the VA Healthcare system from the very beginning. The first director of the Veterans Bureau back in 1921, was removed just two years after taking office and went to prison for defrauding the government on hospital contracts. In the ensuing years, the administration underwent many changes. Vietnam veterans were exposed to "Agent Orange", a tactical herbicide used to remove trees and dense foliage, which caused major health issues. The VA has spent years dealing with the consequences of those exposures.

DEATHS & DATA BREACHES

In March of 1991 the VA accepted responsibility for eight out of more than 40 deaths of vascular and orthopedic surgical patients.
In 2006 two teens stole a laptop computer and external hard drive containing the personal information of approximately 26 million veterans from a VA data analyst, and in 2009, the VA paid $20 million to settle a related class action lawsuit.

IMPROPER STERILIZATION

In February 2009 more than 6,000 patients were notified that they may have been exposed to infectious diseases at the Alvin C. York VA Medical Center in Murfreesboro, Tennessee, due to contaminated endoscopic equipment.
During the same time period, 1,200 people may have been treated with contaminated equipment at the Charlie Norwood VA Medical Center in Augusta, Georgia.
The next month, more than 3,000 people who had colonoscopies at VA facilities in Miami may have been exposed to hepatitis and HIV.
In 2010, more than 1,800 veterans treated at the John Cochran VA hospital in St. Louis may have been exposed to infectious diseases during dental procedures.
In 2011 nine Ohio veterans tested positive for hepatitis after routine dental work at a VA clinic in Dayton, Ohio.
From February 2011 to November 2012 at least six veterans died due to an outbreak of Legionnaires' Disease at VA facilities in Pennsylvania.
In December of 2016, 592 people may have been exposed to HIV, and hepatitis B and C from receiving dental care at Tomah VA Medical Center in Wisconsin.

CURRENT PROBLEMS

A summary of the most serious issues the Veterans Health Administration faces today: wait times, suicides, and murders.

Wait Times

In 2013, the VA began facing scrutiny over long wait times for veteran care. Information was uncovered that revealed untold numbers of veterans had died because of long wait times for simple medical screenings. The following year, the VA was exposed for keeping secret lists of patient appointments created to hide the fact that patients were waiting months to be seen at several VA hospitals across the country. In mid-2014, the VA's Office of the Inspector General investigated 26 facilities because of accusations of doctored waiting times. A

preliminary report by the VA's inspector general indicated at least 1,700 veterans waiting to see a doctor were never scheduled for an appointment and were never placed on a waitlist at the Veterans Affairs medical center in Phoenix. As a result, the VA Secretary resigned. The results of the audit of hundreds of facilities revealed that 63,869 veterans enrolled in the VA health care system in the previous 10 years had yet to be seen for an appointment. Since then, information has continued to be uncovered about deaths resulting from malpractice or lack of care. An independent audit was conducted by the Government Accountability Office (GAO) in 2015, two years later, in 2017, no significant improvements were observed. As a result, the GAO created a high risk report. At the bottom of this page an infographic is included with information about the reports made by the GAO.

The USA Today published an article in February of 2019, Death Rates, Bedsores, ER Wait Times: Where Every VA Hospital Lags or Leads Other Medical Care that provides information specific to each VA facility. The article provides an unbiased comparison of VA Healthcare to private sector care. Take a look at the interactive table to the left from that article to see how Veterans Affairs facilities in your area compare to the private sector.

When we look at these stories and statistics its easy to see that we are failing our veterans. They have served our nation and now we must provide them ACCESSIBLE, high quality healthcare. There is no excuse for veterans dying while waiting for treatment.Changes must be made and without delay.

VA Suicides

Suicide has always been an issue with veterans as illustrated in the chart below from ActiVote's Twitter page, but the rate has grown significantly worse. From 2006 to 2017 the number of veteran suicides rose every year except for one. It is estimated that between 17 and 22 veterans commit suicide every day.

The suicides that occur on VA campuses are particularly alarming. There were nineteen suicides on VA campuses from October 2017 to November of 2018. They have continued to occur as recently as October of 2019, as reported by the Washington Examiner, this death was the 35th death on a VA campus in two years. These campus suicides are intended to send a message and could be considered the ultimate form of protest. In an article on the parking lot suicides from the Washington Post Eric Caine, director of the Injury Control Research Center for Suicide Prevention at the University of Rochester, is quoted as saying,

"These suicides are sentinel events. It’s very important for the VA to recognize that the place of a suicide can have great meaning. There is a real moral imperative and invitation here to take a close inspection of the quality of services at the facility level.”

As these campus suicides continue to occur, the VA's public outreach efforts have declined. In 2018 the VA's budget for promoting their crisis hotline was $6.2 million. According to a Time Magazine article, in September of that year, the VA had only spent $57,000, less than 1% of the funds allotted, according to GAO auditors. Social media posts dropped by more than two-thirds from 2017 to 2018, and two planned public service announcements were delayed. For more than a year, VA did not air any outreach messages on television or radio.

The Department of Veterans Affairs does not deny this problem. They are committed to taking action according to the Chairman of House Committee on Veterans Affairs, Mark Takano's, press release on September 20, 2019, quoted below in reaction to new veteran suicide data for 2017.

“As Chairman of the House Committee on Veterans’ Affairs, I’ve made addressing veteran suicide my top priority-- but these numbers make it clear we’re not doing enough. This new data reaffirms the urgent need for Americans to immediately act to address veteran suicide, and it serves as a sobering reminder that we cannot take our minds off this crisis for one second.

“The suicide rate among veterans is 1.5 times higher than the rate for non-veteran adults and sadly, the rate of suicide among women veterans specifically, is more than 2.2 times higher. We must continue to push through and find new, creative solutions to reduce veteran suicide.

“Particularly heartbreaking is the rate at which veterans have died by suicide on VA property. That’s why I called for a nation-wide stand-down to ensure all VA staff have the training they need to care for veterans in crisis to assess whether all facilities are equipped with key safety features, and to discern any gaps in policies or procedures that we can fix. We should not look solely to Congress, the VA or our Veteran Service Organizations for all the answers. But I know that together, we can find a way to truly be there for our veterans in crisis.”

Based on the statistics, the current measures being taken are not enough. The leadership of Veterans Affairs says that suicide prevention is a priority, but past actions have failed to

live up to these promises. Suicide is an issue that concerns our whole nation, and veterans are a particularly high risk population. More needs to be done to remove the stigma associated with seeking mental health care. Help must be accessible to all veterans who are suffering. Warning signs cannot be ignored. If you know a veteran who is struggling with mental health issues there are resources out there to help. You can call the phone number in the image above, or click on it to go to the Veterans Crisis Line homepage.

VA Murders

The latest VA scandal to make national headlines occurred at the Louis A. Johnson VA Medical Center in Clarksburg, WV. In August of 2019, the story broke that a series of 10 or 11 deaths at the VA between mid 2017

and August of 2018 were being investigated for foul play. Three of the 11 have been ruled homicides as of mid-October 2019. The video to the right is from NBC New's YouTube channel posted on August 30, 2019. The video includes interviews with the family of Kirk McDermott, and 82-year-old veteran whose death was ruled a homicide this summer. The cause, as with the

rest of the suspicious deaths, was an injection of a large amount of insulin. The video below is from a recent USA Today article and includes interviews with the family of George Nelson Shaw, Sr., another elderly victim.

These tragedies are another example of how the VA has failed the veterans who have sacrificed so much to serve our nation. Families, government officials, and concerned citizens are asking when the investigation will be completed and no answers have been forthcoming. There must be accountability within Veterans Affairs.

As, Tony O’Dell, five of the victims' families legal representative, said in an interview with local WV news channel 12 WBOY,

"They put their lives at risk for us. They served their country. And they deserve the very best and they didn’t get it. And it’s hard to imagine the disappointment and the betrayal that these families feel."

The infographic below includes information about the issues found by the GAO during their independent audit in 2015 and then the high risk report created in 2017 as a result of the VA's lack of improvement. You can click on the image to go to the GAO's website.

WHAT DOES THE VA SAY?

Take a look at this PBS News Hour interview with the secretary of Veterans Affairs on July 11, 2019. They discuss the Mission Act, veteran suicide prevention, veteran homelessness, and female veteran healthcare.