More $$ AMMO $$ Contributed for C-123 Veterans Association Work in Washington DC

A certain Chief Master Sergeant from Westover sent in a check to help toward our expenses in Washington. It is much appreciated ammo toward solving our remaining issue of retroactive disability compensation! Thanks, Chief H.

More such help is welcome.

How VBA Staffers Mistreated C-123 Vets for Four Years

C-123 veterans were, quite simply, abused from the first Agent Orange claims submitted right up to the present day, and we continue to be screwed until something is done regarding retroactive disability compensation. Know this: Most of the abuse was by certain staff in both VHA and VBA working hard, and quite successfully, preventing our exposure claims from being honored.

From Secretary Shinseki right on down the line of VA leaders, the promise to us and our Congressional representatives was repeatedly, "no blanket denial, and a case-by-case evaluation of claims." Specifically, the Secretary wrote (in his letter to Senator Burr, originally drafted by VBA's Agent Orange desk:)

"VA evaluates such claims on a case-by-case basis to determine if the available evidence supports service connection on a facts-found basis." "Accordingly, VA does not have a 'blanket policy' for denying such claims."

Secretary Shinseki even provided his official departmental C-123 fact sheet to the Senate Veterans Affairs Committee repeating that promise of fair treatment. This was in response to Senator Burr's letter asking...

"All of this suggests that VA may essentially have a blanket policy of denying any claims based on alleged exposure to dioxin while serving aboard the C-123 planes, regardless of the weight of information submitted in a particular case. 

With that in mind, I ask you to ensure that any disability claims from the veterans who operated these C-123s will not be pre-judged as lacking merit but, rather, will be considered based on the facts of each particular case."

The Secretary offered Senator Burr important general assurances of proper treatment of C-123 claims. Yet from the VBA decisions on our claims, we saw 100% denials by VA.

We saw the real VA policy repeatedly used to doom every single C-123 veteran's claim as repeated in most denied claims:

"Every attempt was made to verify your exposure to herbicides. Although you submitted numerous amounts of evidence to support your claim, VA regulations do not allow us to concede exposure to herbicides for Veterans who claim they were exposed to herbicides used after the Vietnam war while flying in aircraft used to spray those chemicals." 

The deception must be clear to all: Secretary Shinseki promised even-handed case-by-case C-123 claims, and denied any VA blanket policy against those claims. But VA then proceeded to refuse 100% of the claims, stating VA has regulations forbidding such claims.

It stayed this way for four and a half years. VA promising in every breath that C-123 claims were processed fairly and by the law, yet always refusing every one of them and not bothering to mention their universal denial to the legislators.

Further, remember VA's statement about "regulations do not allow..." Turns out there never was any such regulation. Never existed, and VA acknowledged recently it was often repeated but in error.

LtCol Paul Bailey, combat veteran of the 82nd
Airborne at age 18. He had 34 years of enlisted
and commissioned Army & Air Force service.

There's more abuse. In Paul Bailey's 2013 Agent Orange denial, he submitted 49 pieces of substantiating evidence. VA is required to respond to each piece of evidence, but here they simply wrote that his lay statement wasn't adequate to prove his case.

Ignored completely were all other items of evidence. This included statements from aircraft commanders, squadron commanders, fellow veterans, university schools of public health, VA physicians, professors of medicine, toxicologists, toxicology tests on Bailey's aircraft, Air Force records, medical treatment records, CDC Agency for Toxic Substance and Disease Registry findings, National Institute of Health findings and more. All ignored without comment.

There is no correlation to VA's statement on the denial that "every attempt was made to verify your exposure." Rather, the facts make a lie of that statement because not only was no effort made to verify exposure but instead, a blind eye was turned to more than enough evidence to have granted service connection. Actually, VA did exactly that six months later when, under political and public pressure, VA Manchester NH reconsidered the case and granted the claim even though the raters in Manchester worked against headquarters' resistance.

The veteran had already entered hospice then with his final battle with cancer. A few weeks later, Paul Bailey was dead, ending our fifty years of friendship and service together.

There's even more to the abuse heaped on C-123 vets. Along with Major Marlene Wentworth, I met with VBA's Mr Tom Murphy, Director of Compensation and Pension. There, in front of his staff, Mr. Murphy explained how no amount of proof from whatever source would permit a C-123 claim to reach VA's "as likely to as not" threshold for approval.

He referred me to Dr. Terry Walters in VHA's Post Deployment Public Health Section, and in my subsequent phone call with her, she who explained that we were simply never exposed. She went further, detailing how exposure equals contamination field (such as Agent Orange) plus bioavailability...the ability of a toxin to enter the body and cause harm. Dr. Walters felt our "exposures" during ten years aboard former Agent Orange spray aircraft didn't satisfy her definition and therefore, we weren't exposed and our claims baseless. (Interesting how none of this reached Secretary Shinseki for his letter and fact sheet to Senator Burr!)

This redefinition by VHA of a fundamental term in toxicology was deemed "unscientific" by the director of the National Toxicology Program. The redefinition even differed from the CDC Agency for Toxic Substances and Disease Registry standard list of terms, and contrasted with Dorland's Illustrated Medical Dictionary, VA's usual text for scientific and medical definitions.

Still, however unusual or unscientific, Dr. Walter's redefinition served VHA's purpose – keeping C-123 claims denied until June 19 2015. Only in December 2015 did we learn from VA's answers to Senator Gardner's questions that their redefinition of exposure in VHA was the personal creation of Dr. Terra Irons, only a year or so out of Chapel Hill. No peer review, no acceptance by VA outside VHA Public Health, no nothing...just Dr. Irons. A key concept in science redefined just to keep C-123 veterans from VA treatment of C-123 Agent Orange illnesses.

Why? Because the law, and several restatements of VA's duties to exposed veterans detailed how VA would provide the full range of medical care and compensation to all vets who'd been exposed to Agent Orange. So to VHA, wanting badly to prevent C-123 claims, it became important to prevent acknowledgement of any exposure by us to Agent Orange.

So they simply changed the ground rules, redefined exposure, and as if by magic, we weren't exposed. At least, not until the January 9 2015 release by the Institute of Medicine of their C-123 Agent Orange exposure report. And that's when science finally overcame VHA individuals' attitudes and staff policies – because C-123 veterans indeed had been exposed. It was effective, but as illogical as redefining green as blue.

We were poorly treated by VA for many years. They let our crewmates sicken and die without VA medical care and other benefits due each of us. Even today, players in VA still work hard to prevent retroactive compensation due us as it is due all other veterans once disability claims are finally resolved.

It seems to take the intervention of the Secretary to make things right for us, and for so many other groups of veterans like our Camp Lejeune brothers and sisters.

Some Names Needed: C-123 veterans whose claims have been denied by BVA

We're looking for a few good losers!

Really! We need to know of our C-123 veterans whose Agent Orange exposure claims have been denied at the local regional office, and whose appeals have also been denied by the Board of Veterans Appeals. For this project,  WE NEED ONLY VETS WHOSE CLAIMS ARE BVA-DENIED!

If that's you, or somebody you know, please drop me a line because we need your help so we can help all our vets with current issues.

NEWEST VA FREEDOM OF INFORMATION ACT RELEASE VERY INFORMATIVE – & Even More Disturbing

There are hundreds of files on the most recent VA Freedom of Information Act document release just provided us by our terrific attorneys at Davis Wright Tremaine.

You can read them all in this Google Docs folder...and you'll find an eye full if you read with your eyes wide open, and consider what was written compared to the Institute of Medicine recent affirmation of our exposures! No wonder it took four years to get to the point today, when VA is only now considering how to care for us. And no promises made yet!

A great many of these FOIA files clearly show VA's unending resistance to C-123 veterans' Agent Orange claims. "Not on my watch," is the motto smearing so many of these files, although not in those words.

Not a single file here, or in any earlier documents we've received, has a single question raised about whether our veterans were exposed. Instead, VA puts its brick wall in front of us and invites head-banging, knowing we would get nowhere. Never was a question raised about whether a way could be found to include, rather than forbid, C-123 veterans from entering their wonderful hospital corridors.

No wonder we had to fight in US District Court to get these papers. No wonder, even with so many obviously vital parts redacted, VA didn't want this record made public.

The attitude of is clear, especially in VBA where staffers look for unflattering references in this blog or in correspondence with VA and take umbrage. From 2011 when the issue first appeared at 1800 G Street in Washington, dedicated opponents rose to dispute any C-123 veteran's claim. VA staffers consistently informs others that the 1991 Agent Orange Act was meant only for Vietnam veterans during the time period allowed, but skipped mention of the multiple postings in the Federal Register by which VA assured Congress that all veterans with evidence of exposure would be treated the same as men and women who served in Vietnam.

VBA also insisted that non-Vietnam exposures to Agent Orange, even if fact-proven and claiming Agent Orange-recognized illnesses, must require proof that the illness didn't result from another cause. VA is of course expert with this issue and cannot have made these statements in ignorance, but rather policy. VA folks know the law and regulations dictate otherwise, but why worry about such niggling details which conflict with policy? Even if that policy was unpublished, unofficial, and in the end...in error.

VA regulations provide for inquiries to the DOD Joint Services Records Research Center if veterans claim on-Vietnam exposures. Many times, JSRRC tried to forward documents from other federal agencies, only to have them dismissed by VBA, Reading these files, I find myself described in words I'd consider unflattering, let's say.

Except for persistent. I see persistent a lot in reading these FOIA files.

That begs the awful question...why does any veteran have to be persistent, any more than completing the FDC and speaking honestly about the claim? Why did this veteran, rated by VA itself as "catastrophically disabled,"  have to spend four of the last few years in my piggy bank of life trying so hard? What about other veterans, other disabilities, other exposures? Are those veterans going to face a VA like the VA which put their brick wall in our faces?

Conclusion about this most recent FOIA release? It is policy that VA was clearly determined to preserve, and that policy was to prevent C-123 veterans' claims.

Compare responses to legislators, governors and state directors of veterans affairs (thank you, Oregon and North Carolina!!) hard with the recent release of the Institute of Medicine C-123 report. Policy, at least the policy of individual players, kept us out of those hospitals for years. We'd be outside still, fingers on the door bell, if not for the skills and care of reporters, scientists and legislators who've stood up for us since 2011.

God bless you all, VA included. Let's take care of veterans from this point forward, okay?

More disturbing facts from the FOIAs:
1. Secretary Shinseki said that Lt Col Paul Bailey's cancer claim shouldn't have been granted and sought opinions on getting it reversed as an error. Some VA staffer asked how Bailey could have qualified as "exposed" with "only two days on Patches." This statement required deliberately overlooking all the flight documents submitted placing Paul on Patches and the other contaminated former Ranch Hand aircraft. Note: Pauls VA award came just before his death...he'd already entered hospice.
2. VA's Agent Orange consultant was persistent (my turn for that word, having noted VA's frequent use of it) in steps to prevent C-123 veterans' claims. He got $600,000 for his efforts through his no-bid sole source contract with VA; we got financial loss, suffering and death.
3. Not a single mention is made anywhere of VA's frequent Federal Register statements about non-Vietnam Agent Orange exposures. VA is held to these publications, but did they feel best to pretend the don't exist?
4. I'm stopping here. You read. You decide if this is how VA promised to treat our veterans. It is depressing to keep writing about.

Claims errors, long appeals still haunt disabled veterans–years wasted in appeals which should have been accurately resolved in the beginning!

BY MARK FLATTEN | DECEMBER 12, 2013 AT 10:56 AM 

A veteran who challenges an initial rating faces an average of more than three additional years...

Mistakes and years-long appeals continue to haunt veterans seeking disability benefits even as the Department of Veterans Affairs achieves some success in reducing the backlog of initial claims, key senators warned a top agency official Wednesday.

Allison Hickey, under secretary for benefits at the veterans’ agency, insisted that claims processors have reached an unprecedented accuracy rate of 90 percent, as they dramatically reduced the backlog of disability claims.

But that runs contrary to recent findings by the agency's inspector general, which continues to find high rates of mistakes in claims it reviews, and by an independent examination of VA decisions done by the American Legion, which identified errors in more than half the cases.

“Are they wrong?” Sen. Richard Burr, R-N.C., the ranking Republican on the Senate Veterans Affairs Committee, asked Hickey.

“They are right for the way they look at it,” Hickey replied. “We are right for the way we measure it.”

Hickey did not explain the different methods for determining whether a claim is accurately rated. But she did say doing the cases correctly is an important part of the VA Secretary Eric Shinseki’s goal of ensuring all disability claims receive an initial rating within 125 days with 98 percent accuracy by 2015.

“We will not trade production for quality,” Hickey said, adding VA is still on track to meet that goal.

Of the six most recent reviews of claims-processing accuracy done by the VA inspector general, only one regional office had an error rate in the 10-percent range.

Three of the six offices made mistakes in more than 40 percent of the cases examined by the IG. The error rate in the Newark office was more than 45 percent.

A separate review of how the Los Angeles office processed claims under an initiative launched in April to eliminate all cases that were more than two years old found mistakes in more than 90 percent of the cases because of a flawed policy interpretation.

Hickey said that was an isolated incident and was corrected even before the IG got involved.

Recent studies by the American Legion show error rates as high as 83 percent for certain types of claims in certain offices.

Burr and committee chairman Sen. Bernie Sanders, I-Vt., honed in on the contradictions in the accuracy assertions of the VA, as well as the growing number of appeals that take years to resolve.

“Reducing the backlog at the expense of accuracy is not acceptable,” Sanders said, a sentiment echoed by several committee members from both parties.

As the Washington Examiner reported last month, errors in the initial rating of a disability claim can doom veterans to years of appeals.

A veteran who challenges an initial rating faces an average of more than three additional years to get a verdict from the Board of Veterans Appeals, according to agency reports.

In almost half of the cases, the board determines the regional office did not have enough information and sends the case back for more work. Of the cases it does decide, the board sides with the veteran more often than the agency.

Overall, almost three-fourths of the cases reviewed by the appeals board are either remanded to the regional office for more work, or decided in the veteran’s favor.

“It does astound me and it does kind of make us chuckle and roll our eyes when they sit there and say VA’s got a 90-percent accuracy rating,” Zack Hearn, deputy director for claims at the American Legion, told the Examiner.

The VA has long been under pressure to reduce the backlog of initial disability claims, filed by veterans seeking compensation for service-connected injuries or illnesses.

The backlog peaked in March, when more than 70 percent of the almost 900,000 cases in the system were more than 125 days old.

The agency responded in April by targeting the oldest claims and taking other steps including requiring claims processors to work at least 20 hours per month of overtime.

In its most recent report issued earlier this month, VA states about 57 percent of its 693,857 cases are backlogged.

At the same time, the number of appeals has ballooned from about 250,000 in March to 266,507 in December.

VA does not have a standard by which an appeal is considered backlogged, Hickey said.

Sanders said the time it takes to resolve an appeal is “clearly unacceptable” and asked Hickey to submit a plan within 45 days outlining steps to reduce wait times.