Congress shell game with veterans lives

Part Two of Congress Played Shell Game With Veterans
There is no need for me to add to any of this. I'll just let the reports show you what was happening while Congress was playing their games.

Nationwide, the number of Iraq and Afghanistan war veterans diagnosed with PTSD at VA medical facilities jumped by nearly 70 percent in the 12 months ending June 30, 2007.

In Tucson, 31 percent of the combat veterans who have come to the VA for medical care since last October have been diagnosed with post-traumatic stress disorder.

Four Erie County soldiers committed suicide
Matthew A. Proulx. Andrew L. Norlund. Justin C. Reyes. Gary M. Underhill. They didn’t die in combat. They didn’t die from friendly fire. They died by their own hands.

Veteran Suicides Twice Rate of Civilians
CBS News has now completed a five-month study of death records for 2004-05 which shows that the actual figures are "much higher" than those reported by the VA. Across the total US veteran population of 25 million, CBS found that suicide rates were more than twice as high as for non-veterans (according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, suicide accounted for 32,439 deaths in 2004).

CBS spoke to the families of several veterans who killed themselves after returning from Iraq. "The war didn't end for him when he came home," said the mother of one soldier. "I think he was being tormented and tortured by his experiences."

In a November 9, 2007, VA court filing related to our VCS class action lawsuit against VA, attorneys for VA revealed that nearly 264,000 Iraq and Afghanistan war veterans were already treated in VA hospitals and clinics through the end of October 2007.

Minnesota Marine's case is part of lawsuit against VA
The suicide of Jonathan Schulze is cited in the class-action suit filed by two national veterans groups.
By KEVIN GILES, Star Tribune
Last update: February 22, 2008

A class-action lawsuit filed by two national veterans organizations accusing the U.S. Veterans Administration of neglecting psychological fallout from the Iraq and Afghanistan wars cites the suicide of Minnesota Marine veteran Jonathan Schulze.

Schulze is one of several deceased veterans named in the suit, which a judge last month allowed to proceed and is headed for a hearing in U.S. District Court in San Francisco in March. Schulze, 25, committed suicide in January 2007 in New Prague, Minn., five days after he allegedly was turned away from the VA hospital in St. Cloud when seeking psychiatric help.

He had fought in Iraq. Medical records showed that he suffered from post-traumatic stress disorder.

PALISADES - After two tours in Iraq with the Marine Corps Reserve, Steven Vickerman tried to resume a normal life at home with his wife, but he could not shake a feeling of despair.

The VA, they believed, had failed their son. The services available, they said, were insufficient, and the government should do more to address the issue for returning war vets.

"There should be something that can be done, not only for the proud soldiers but also for their families," Carole Vickerman said. "When you hear the word 'stress,' it sounds so innocuous. It's not stress; it's a killer."

Steven Vickerman, a Tappan Zee High School graduate, enlisted in the Marine Corps Reserve in 1998. A whiz at technical jobs and an electrician by trade, the staff sergeant served as a small arms technician with Marine Aircraft Group 49, Detachment B, at Stewart Air National Guard Base in Newburgh.

His first tour in Iraq was interrupted when he returned home to be with his older brother, who was dying of a brain tumor. Robert died at age 35. Vickerman served a second tour and was honorably discharged in 2005.

About two weeks ago, Vickerman's wife went on a business trip in New York City and could not reach her husband by phone. The Vickermans also could not reach him.

They called his therapist, who was scheduled to see him on a Wednesday, but Vickerman missed his appointment. The therapist called police, who found Vickerman dead at his home, where he had hanged himself.

But while all this was happening and Congress was cutting back there were lawsuits going on and Doctors telling the truth.

A deposition by a VA medical center psychiatrist caring for veterans of the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan backed up the veterans groups' assertion that the department had not done enough to provide adequate mental health care for all veterans.

Dr. Marcus Nemuth, medical director of Psychiatry Emergency Service for VA's Puget Sound Health Care System in Seattle, which operates three hospitals, said in his deposition on March 25 that he expected a high volume of post-traumatic stress disorder cases among veterans returning from Afghanistan and Iraq. He said he was concerned with both with the quantity and quality of care provided to those veterans.

Nemuth said during the past year he had seen such a growth in the caseload of Afghanistan and Iraq veterans seeking psychiatric emergency help at the Seattle VA hospital that he concluded the department faced a "tsunami of medical need."

Then there was Walter Reed Hospital. Dana Priest and Anne Hull proved what reporters could do when they cared enough to investigate and tell the truth.

Post reporter Dana Priest said the Walter Reed story was among the work in which she took the most pride. She and Hull worked on the story for about six months, developing sources among soldiers and their families.

``It's a reminder of what basic journalism can get you involved in,'' she said. ``At a time when journalism is under this cloud of financial uncertainty, reporters have to stay focused, and if we don't, we sort of doom people like the Army specialist who lived with the cockroaches in Building 18.

``We can do better than that.''

We could do better than all that happened to our veterans but we didn't. That is something no one should ever be expected to be forgiven for.