More famous quotes from VA's favorite Agent Orange "expert," Dr. Alvin Young

Having spent two full careers (even more) specializing in Agent Orange issues, Dr, Al Young has plenty of simply amazing quotes attributed to him.

Amazing, that is, only in revealing how much harm was done to exposed veterans.

His twenty-year USAF career as a scientist mostly focused on weaponizing Agent Orange, followed by attempting to explain away its dangers as its use was suspended in 1971. While at Brooks AFB in 1979, Young told the media that dioxins (the toxin in Agent Orange) released into the environment seem to be "much less hazardous than lab tests suggest."

The USAF later loaned him to the VA where he was under Dr. Shepard first head of their Environmental Medicine section (Agent Orange Projects Office,) and responsible for fending off the early wave of Vietnam vets' exposure claims. That's right – the same guy who weaponized Agent Orange was given a desk at VA and told to block exposure claims.

He led the VA's fight for years, but Congress grew frustrated at their obstructionist foot-dragging and passed the 1991Agent Orange Act to settle the issue. 

Retirement from the Air Force brought Young out of the VA to the White House. His duty: director of the Office of Technology Assessment. He coordinated the evaluation/policy of the effects of Agent Orange on Vietnam veterans, and general issues involving Agent Orange affecting various other federal agencies.

One of his 1983 statements was that he didn't think dioxin constituted a national problem, but it might pose a problem in specific parts of the country. Yeah, "might." A year later he contradicted himself when testifying before a Congressional committee, saying, "I think it definitely is (harmful.) I think the data certainly harmful to humans. One of his most frequent quotes: "We just don't know." In 1984 he was quoted in Toxicity Material News saying, "Dioxin poses no health problems."

2014 brought Dr. Young before the Institute of Medicine C-123 Agent Orange exposure committee. There we saw a great number of his truly interesting statements:
1. First, telling the IOM he wasn't representing the VA. In fact, he was still operating under his $25,000 per month consulting contract to support VA's resistance to Agent Orange claims.
2. Next, asked why the C-123s were destroyed if not contaminated, he said it was because USAF needed the storage space and the planes were unsaleable. Young skipped revealing the key point about how in 2009 he'd repeatedly recommended their destruction because of Agent Orange, and because we vets might apply for exposure benefits for our illnesses. 
3. What was he thinking?? Dr. Young presented IOM a set of photos of C-123 #664 supposedly taken by the Air Force in 1971, saying they showed the superb restoration and decontamination after Vietnam. His photos were indeed of #664, but were taken in 2004 by the Pennsylvania-based Air Heritage Museum who did the restoration themselves. Young simply lifted the photos right from the museum's web site.
4. Dr. Young stressed to the committee that no Agent Orange spray missions were done with the ramp doors open. But –  just two weeks later the Sunday Boston Globe had a front-page photo of a Ranch Hand C-123 doing exactly that in Vietnam.

But for most of us, our all-time favorite Al Young quote came in 2011: C-123 vets "are hoping they can cash in on  tax-free money" and are "trash-haulers." C-123 vets are "concocting exposure stories about Agent Orange hoping that some Congressional member will feel sorry for them." He concluded, "I have no respect for such free loaders. If not freeloading, what is their motive?"

Great thoughts fron Young, who between 2012-2014 profited from his no-bid sole-source $600,000 contract with VA to help block our claims.

VA: SAME-DAY CARE PROMISED NATIONWIDE!

Seeking to end years of scandal over patient treatment delays, the Department of Veterans Affairs is working to offer its patients same-day care at each of its medical centers by year's end.

The goal is part of a nine-point list of initiatives announced Friday, which is being implemented at clinics and hospitals across the nation to better care for veterans in the embattled health system.

Already, 34 facilities offer that same-day primary and mental health care. Colorado Springs is not on that list, though the capability is expected to expand, said Dr. David Shulkin, the VA's undersecretary for health, during a conference for health care journalists in Cleveland.

"This is not only possible - we're doing it today," Shulkin said. "What we need to do is to consistently do it across our 168 member centers."

The VA also plans to roll out an app across the nation that allows patients to schedule their own appointments. And the health care system is implementing a new, easier-to-use scheduling system for its staff, Shulkin said.

The initiative, called a "declaration of access" comes as the agency continues to face withering criticism over the falsification of appointment records across the nation - including at Colorado Springs' clinic at Centennial Boulevard and Fillmore Street.

A recent report by the agency's inspector general found 11.5 percent of veteran appointments for care in Colorado Springs were delayed by 30 days or more. The figure is nearly four times the national rate, and it's up 7 percent from before the new 76,000-square-foot clinic first opened.

The report also found that local clinic workers delayed adding scores of veterans to a list for the "Veterans Choice" program, which would have allowed them to seek private care. It impacted 229 of 450 cases reviewed, the report said.

The new goals are meant to help the VA move past those issues, Shulkin said.

"That is not what we believe represents the current VA today," said Shulkin, of treatment delays that first gained notoriety two years ago. "We've now moved beyond that, reaffirmed our values and making sure we're putting systems in place that work for veterans."

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VA Violates 2010 Order from US Circuit Court of Appeals

Veterans Benefits Administration has violated a 2010 order from the US Circuit Court of Appeals. VA had been ordered to publish, and to implement, various rules involving Agent Orange exposure and veterans' benefits. The order flowed from a petition for a writ of mandamus from several veterans organizations and the National Veterans Legal Services Program.

And involved was the eligibility – the right – of C-123 veterans to exposure benefits.

The court approved the request for the writ and ordered the Secretary to publish in the Federal Register the changes in benefits recommended shortly before by the National Academy of Sciences/Institute of Medicine. The 1991 Agent Orange Act states that the Secretary has 60 days to implement such changes and the writ enforced that timely response upon the VA, which VA had been stalling on for too long.

The VA complied with the order, and on August 30 2010 published in the Federal Register the required rule changes bringing into effect the recommendations from NAS. C-123 veterans are directly affected in two ways:
1. The announcements in the Federal Register are binding upon VA 
2. The announcement on August 30 2010 included the VA's statement that no revision on VA regulations (VA 21-1MR) was necessary to address non-Vietnam exposure claims because VA would presume all such situations with recognized Agent Orange illnesses resulting would be treated the same as Vietnam veterans' "presumptive service connection"

So now VA has dodged its obligations to C-123 veterans by redefining "exposure" to prevent acknowledging C-123 veterans' fact-proven exposure claims. Setting up a definition of exposure unique to federal government medical and scientific agencies, VA defies opinions submitted by DOD, USPHS, CDC, EPA, NIH and other authorities to pretend this group of vets were never exposed at all.

And in this deception, not only do they defy their own rules, which courts have said have the rule of law, but they defy the US Circuit Court of Appeals. This is because, having published as ordered the changes recommended by the NAS, VA opts to avoid enforcing them and has for years refused to permit C-123 veterans to receive VA medical care.

VA Announcement in Federal Register
30 August 2010