The story behind HR 2647 is Sgt.Coleman Bean

Legislation would help some returning veterans
Coda • GREG BEAN
This Fourth of July was certainly a bittersweet holiday in our home. Those who know me know that our son Coleman, an Army sergeant who served two tours in Iraq, took his own life last September.




In the months since, our family has learned a lot about the problems faced by returning vets, and the difficulties they sometimes have finding and obtaining services like psychological and career counseling.

We don't know that better availability of services would have changed our own personal outcome, and we will never know. But we did make a decision to do whatever is in our power to make a difference for some other soldiers and those soldiers' families.

As part of that effort, I reached out to U.S. Rep. Rush Holt this spring and I found him to be a truly caring man.And at the end of one of our conversations, he told me that he would begin working on legislation to address some of the problems, and he put me in touch with Patrick Eddington, his Senior Policy Advisor for Defense and Intelligence Issues. I spoke with Patrick Eddington at some length, and he assured me of the congressman's commitment to the issue and his determination to do something meaningful.

That conversation was several months ago, and I don't know that I believed anything would ever come of it. So I was overjoyed last week when Rep. Holt called me to tell me that an amendment he had proposed had passed the House and has a good shot at becoming law. First, however, it must pass a conference committee with the Senate, but there's great optimism the amendment will survive intact.

The amendment to H.R. 2647 would require the Secretary of Defense to call returning Individual Ready Reserve veterans once every 90 days to determine the emotional, psychological, medical and career needs of the veterans. It would also require any IRR veteran identified as being at risk of selfcaused harm to be referred to the nearest military medical treatment facility or accredited TRICARE provider for immediate evaluation and treatment by a qualified mental health care provider.
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http://ems.gmnews.com/news/2009/0708/greg_bean/016.html

Congress to CIA: Review Gulf War illness info

Congress to CIA: Review Gulf War illness info

By Kelly Kennedy - Staff writer
Posted : Tuesday Jun 23, 2009 18:44:44 EDT

After a former CIA employee told a team created to investigate Gulf War illness that 1.5 million documents exist detailing poisonous gas exposures during Operation Desert Storm, Congress is asking the CIA to review the secret classifications of those documents.

“Ill Desert Storm veterans have been waiting for years for our government to make public any information in its possession about the kinds of toxic agents they may have been exposed to during and immediately after the 1991 war,” Rep. Rush Holt, D-N.J., said in a prepared statement. “This is a long-overdue stop toward meeting that goal.”

The intelligence authorization bill now includes language that would require the CIA to review the classification of those documents, with the intent of declassifying them.

Studies have shown that veterans exposed to sarin — which the military accidentally doused troops with when the 82nd Airborne Division destroyed an Iraqi chemical weapons dump in Khamisiyah in 1991 — are more likely to suffer from symptoms of Gulf War illness.
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http://www.armytimes.com/news/2009/06/military_gulfwar_cia_062309w/