VA C-123 Update: "Nothing to report, Be patient."

"Nothing to report, Be patient."

That was today's report when I asked for an update from a VA official. "Be patient," was the reply, as it has been all along.

Five months into the post-IOM process (counting from the January 2015 IOM report, and four years two months into the claim process (counting from our first C-123 Association veterans' claims) we're asked to be patient.

These months and years have been a very long time to do without VA medical care. No VA or other public employee with health care coverage would tolerate such a delay in their health care.

But VA's inertia and disinterest, preceded by VA's determination to prevent claims regardless of merit, has left veterans without life-saving and quality of life enhancing service.

Besides denied medical care and disability compensation, C-123 veterans have been forced to forfeit pharmacy, dental, optometry, rehab, counseling, hospice, home health care, independent living services and all the other VA programs designed around the needs of disabled veterans.

Its not that VA disagrees with C-123 veterans' eligibility for care. Its just that they haven't gotten around to resolving whether it is to be provided by legislation, regulation or some other process.

This doesn't come as a complete surprise to VA. After all, they are the ones who proposed the IOM study in 2012 (although they also quickly broke their promise to do the study) and who finally ordered the C-123 study in 2014, which was finally submitted to the Secretary on January 8, 2015. The IOM report would only have one of two findings...C-123 veterans were exposed, or they were not.

Two possible outcomes. Neither of which VA prepared for during the year-long study, and now VA continues to insist they are coming out with something in a few weeks or so. Did the answer somehow catch VA by surprise, as they had only a year or so to anticipate the result and prepare?

Only two responses to the C-123 report had to be considered: were the veterans exposed and harmed, or not? VA prepared for neither conclusion, virtually welcoming its own lack of preparation as justification for five more months of delay. Assurances about VA's C-123 veterans' program announcement were given to the Senate Veterans Affairs Committee under oath in February, yet nothing happened that we know of. Similar promises made during the last five months had similar results...nothing.

We know there are folks inside VA who care mightily about us, as is their duty. Unfortunately, their struggle within the Department pits them against numerous staffers whose personal policies conflict with the IOM recommendations, and who are far less motivated to permit our access to VA care – we might even say, based on the track record, many VA staffers remain as determined as ever to prevent our claims despite all legal and scientific merit.

Today, the word from VA was "samo-samo." Meaning go away, find your medical care somewhere else. Anywhere but the VA. Be patient.

Vietnam Vets of America demands Agent Orange benefits NOW for exposed C-123 Westover vets

AGENT ORANGE

• Vietnam Vets of America demands Westover vets exposed to Agent Orange be granted benefits now
• National Commander of VFW demands Westover veterans exposed to Agent Orange receive benefits
• Sen. Elizabeth Warren, others urge Westover Reservists exposed to Agent Orange receive benefits
• Westover Reservists win a battle that should not have been necessary: Editorial
• Westover Reservists exposed to Agent Orange, federal officials rule after 4-year battle

The national president of the Vietnam Veterans of America is calling for bureaucrats from the U.S. Department of Veterans Affairs to be "relieved of their duties" for their continuing failure to grant benefits to veterans from Westover Air Reserve Base and three other military installations who were exposed to Agent Orange while flying planes previously used in the Vietnam War.

The Vietnam Veterans of America has been a strong supporter of the C-123 Veterans.

The two page letter expressed frustration over the fact that the veterans, who flew C-123 Provider planes after they had been used to spray Agent Orange to defoliate the Vietnamese countryside, have been fighting a four-year battle to receive medical benefits and disability payments for those who have fallen ill or become ill later.

"These VA bureaucrats attempting to delay justice ought to be relieved of their duties so they can no longer abuse veterans with their tactic of 'delay, deny until they die.' There is no excuse for why these worthy veterans are still not being treated with the appreciation and the respect their service warrants," John Warren, national president of the Vietnam Veterans of America, wrote.

He said the delay is especially vexing after an Institute of Medicine study commissioned by the Department of Veterans' Affairs determined that the about 2,100 military reservists who flew in or worked on the planes at Westover, Pittsburgh Air National Guard, Rickenbacker Air National Guard Base in Ohio and Hanscom Air Force Base in eastern Massachusetts, had been exposed to Agent Orange and are vulnerable to contracting the more than 20 diseases tied to the chemical.

The Department of Veterans Affairs is continuing to study the Institute of Medicine report, said Meagan Lutz, public affairs specialist for the Department of Veterans Affairs.
"In order to better inform and serve our veterans, the Department is examining policy and legislative issues in order to proceed with its final proposal," she said in an email. (note: different VA executives and public affairs spokespersons have offered a wide range of reasons for VA's delay; Ms. Lutz is the first to suggest the delay is to "better serve" veterans by continuing to refuse them medical care!)

Led by Retired Maj. Wesley T. Carter, now of Colorado, who served as an air medical technician and flight instructor and examiner with Westover's 74th Aeromedical Evacuation Squadron for 20 years, the C-123 group is made up mainly of Westover veterans and has been fighting for the same benefits as those who served in Vietnam. They only discovered four years ago.the planes, which they spent 10 years flying in and working on, had been contaminated with Agent Orange since Vietnam.

The federal government automatically grants anyone who served in Vietnam, even for an hour, health benefits which includes free medications, dental care and other services, and disability payments if they fall ill from any of the diseases known to be caused by Agent Orange.

Also included in the list of supporters is the National Veterans of Foreign Wars. In February six senators, Oregon Sen. Jeff Merkley and North Carolina Sen. Richard Burr, a Democrat and Republican respectively, who have been advocating for the veterans for several years, as well as Sens. Elizabeth Warren, D-Massachusetts; Ron Wyden, D-Oregon; Richard Blumenthal, D-Connecticut, and Michael Bennet, D-Colorado, also signed a strongly-worded to the Department of Veterans Affairs Secretary Robert McDonald to show their support.

"I think it is high time this battle, which has gone on for four years, is over," said Archer Battista, of Belchertown, who retired from Westover as a colonel in 2001 and is a semi-retired lawyer.

Battista, who flew planes at Westover starting in 1974, said he has been trying to help some veterans and their families who are completely overwhelmed by trying to fight the battle for medical care. As a Vietnam veteran, he is already eligible for the benefits.

"All this time the clock is ticking on some very sick people and their survivors," he said. "We know they have a decision and the decision is favorable so what is holding this up?"

It is even more frustrating since there is a second part to the battle. The C-123 Veterans are still trying to acquire squadron rosters with the names of veterans who flew on or worked on the planes at the four bases so they can contact as many veterans as possible to warn them they had been exposed to Agent Orange.

So far all requests to the Air Force have been denied.
reporter: Jeanette DeForge

Newsweek Correspondent Jamie Reno: C-123 Exposures "Tip of the Iceberg"

 (from Newsweek correspondent Jamie Reno, 7 March 2014)

A VA spokesperson said that due to the consideration of possible long-term adverse health effects from potential exposure Agent Orange in C-123 aircraft crewmembers post-Vietnam, VA has formally asked the National Academy of Sciences, Institute of Medicine to study the issue and report back to the department.

Rick Weidman, executive director for policy and government affairs at Vietnam Veterans of America, said that many veterans were exposed to Agent Orange after the Vietnam War – and not just on Johnston Island. “Everything Army veteran Steve House (who recently won his VA exposure claim appeal) has shared with us about his experience at Camp Carroll in Korea is credible and authentic,” Weidman said. “He is telling the truth. He has the documentation, a lot of it.”

But the paradigm for veterans exposed to Agent Orange after the Vietnam War may be about to change in their favor. A study published last week in Environmental Research found that airmen who flew and maintained the C-123 Provider aircraft long after the planes were used to spray Agent Orange over Vietnam were exposed to dangerous levels of the dioxin that remained in the aircraft.

The American Legion, the nation’s largest veterans organization, responded to this news last week with a new call for VA to extend disability compensation benefits to former C-123 aircrews. “I believe this new study will blow a big hole in the DOD and VA’s story,” Army veteran Steve House said.

 “Now there’s proof that vets were exposed well after the Vietnam War. But the C-123s are just the tip of the iceberg.”

Note: The C-123 exposure issue was well-covered in the recent Air Force Times article, about which the Times editors also delivered a hard-hitting editorial calling on the VA to act on the veterans' exposure claims. "Callous and tone deaf" were the editors' description of VA intransigence. 

"Unscientific" was the conclusion of the Committee of Concerned Scientists and Physicians in their letter to Secretary of Veterans Affairs Eric Shinseki.

"That's no dioxin expert" observed the director of a major federal science agency, referring to the staffers who created the Veterans Health Administration's unique redefinition of exposure, developed to block all C-123 veterans' Agent Orange disability claims.