Comments on: Put Your Money Where Your Mouth Is http://blog.psaonline.org/2007/01/22/put-your-money-where-your-mouth-is/ Sat, 13 Mar 2010 17:39:24 -0800 http://wordpress.org/?v=2.9.1 hourly 1 By: Across the Aisle » It’s Worse Than We Think: Military Health Care, SNAFU http://blog.psaonline.org/2007/01/22/put-your-money-where-your-mouth-is/comment-page-1/#comment-35112 Across the Aisle » It’s Worse Than We Think: Military Health Care, SNAFU Thu, 01 Mar 2007 14:31:10 +0000 http://blog.psaonline.org/2007/01/22/put-your-money-where-your-mouth-is/#comment-35112 [...] Chris Preble’s post last week on the Washington Post series about wounded U.S. soldiers lost in the outpatient wilderness at Walter Reed Army Medical Center has also caused me to dwell on this all too painful cost of war.   Like Chris too I am a Navy veteran, albeit back towards the end of the Vietnam War, and though I saw no combat, am all too familiar with the shabby way wounded veterans can be treated. Those who don’t remember the way it was for Vietnam veterans should go rent a copy of Born on the Fourth of July .   Though I touched on this in a January post I think it is worth revisiting.Though Congress and the Defense Department are now in full indignation mode, scheduling oversight hearings, making repairs, including whitewashing the walls (how is that for irony?) at the now infamous Building 18, Secretary Gates warning that officials will be held accountable (Notice anyone fired yet? No, neither have I), appointing an independent commission to investigate, and, of course, blaming the messenger, as in accusing  the Washington Post of presenting a one-sided picture, the truth is that the situation is going to get worse, a lot worse, before it gets better.   First, consider the numbers. The total number of wounded, is far greater than generally thought. As the Linda Bilmes study  I previously cited noted, as of last September more than 50,500 US soldiers have suffered non-mortal wounds in Iraq, Afghanistan and nearby staging locations.  While not all of those are the traumatic type, like those at Walter Reed, enough of them are the sort of wounds that keep on giving, pain and suffering that is, so that both the military and the VA systems will be running full tilt for years to come. By the way, Bilmes estimates that at least 700,000 veterans from the global war on terror will flood the system in the coming years.   Also consider that after discharge many of the soldiers and marines will return to their hometown. Given where the All Volunteer Force has been recruiting from in recent years, rural areas outside metropolitan area, as this analysis by the University of New Hampshire Institute’s Carsey Center noted, they will be lucky to have one doctor in their town, let alone one knowledgeable about prostheses, or a place to go to for physical rehabilitation. They might easily have to travel hundreds of miles for the medical care they require.   The U.S. military health care system is in trouble. And, in fact, if we bothered paying attention, the signs have been there for some time.   Joseph Galloway, former senior military correspondent for Knight Ridder Newspapers, wrote last week of his McClatchy Newspapers colleague Chris Adams’ Feb. 9 report that even by its own measures, the Veterans Administration isn’t prepared to give returning veterans the care they need to help them overcome destructive, and sometimes fatal, mental-health problems. [...] [...] Chris Preble’s post last week on the Washington Post series about wounded U.S. soldiers lost in the outpatient wilderness at Walter Reed Army Medical Center has also caused me to dwell on this all too painful cost of war.   Like Chris too I am a Navy veteran, albeit back towards the end of the Vietnam War, and though I saw no combat, am all too familiar with the shabby way wounded veterans can be treated. Those who don’t remember the way it was for Vietnam veterans should go rent a copy of Born on the Fourth of July .   Though I touched on this in a January post I think it is worth revisiting.Though Congress and the Defense Department are now in full indignation mode, scheduling oversight hearings, making repairs, including whitewashing the walls (how is that for irony?) at the now infamous Building 18, Secretary Gates warning that officials will be held accountable (Notice anyone fired yet? No, neither have I), appointing an independent commission to investigate, and, of course, blaming the messenger, as in accusing  the Washington Post of presenting a one-sided picture, the truth is that the situation is going to get worse, a lot worse, before it gets better.   First, consider the numbers. The total number of wounded, is far greater than generally thought. As the Linda Bilmes study  I previously cited noted, as of last September more than 50,500 US soldiers have suffered non-mortal wounds in Iraq, Afghanistan and nearby staging locations.  While not all of those are the traumatic type, like those at Walter Reed, enough of them are the sort of wounds that keep on giving, pain and suffering that is, so that both the military and the VA systems will be running full tilt for years to come. By the way, Bilmes estimates that at least 700,000 veterans from the global war on terror will flood the system in the coming years.   Also consider that after discharge many of the soldiers and marines will return to their hometown. Given where the All Volunteer Force has been recruiting from in recent years, rural areas outside metropolitan area, as this analysis by the University of New Hampshire Institute’s Carsey Center noted, they will be lucky to have one doctor in their town, let alone one knowledgeable about prostheses, or a place to go to for physical rehabilitation. They might easily have to travel hundreds of miles for the medical care they require.   The U.S. military health care system is in trouble. And, in fact, if we bothered paying attention, the signs have been there for some time.   Joseph Galloway, former senior military correspondent for Knight Ridder Newspapers, wrote last week of his McClatchy Newspapers colleague Chris Adams’ Feb. 9 report that even by its own measures, the Veterans Administration isn’t prepared to give returning veterans the care they need to help them overcome destructive, and sometimes fatal, mental-health problems. [...]

]]> By: Joe Roeber http://blog.psaonline.org/2007/01/22/put-your-money-where-your-mouth-is/comment-page-1/#comment-22954 Joe Roeber Mon, 22 Jan 2007 18:23:39 +0000 http://blog.psaonline.org/2007/01/22/put-your-money-where-your-mouth-is/#comment-22954 A year ago, Linda Bilmes wrote a paper with Joe Stiglitz about the costs of the war. They estimated that the costs of looking after returning vets would be in the range $91-214 billion (costs of running the VA plus brain injuries plus disability payments). A surge or two more and who knows where it will end? ...not, let us hope, to the situation drawn by George Grosz after WW1, when legless vets begged in the streets of Berlin from cigar-smoking astrakhan-collared war profiteers. Joe Roeber A year ago, Linda Bilmes wrote a paper with Joe Stiglitz about the costs of the war. They estimated that the costs of looking after returning vets would be in the range $91-214 billion (costs of running the VA plus brain injuries plus disability payments). A surge or two more and who knows where it will end? …not, let us hope, to the situation drawn by George Grosz after WW1, when legless vets begged in the streets of Berlin from cigar-smoking astrakhan-collared war profiteers.

Joe Roeber

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