Posted on 02/22/2025 5:01:06 AM PST by grcuster
While controversy swirls around last week's mass firing of 1,000 Department of Veterans Affairs' employees, a far greater threat to veterans' health care is going completely unnoticed. Powerful leaders in Congress have quietly unveiled their plan to gut VA-delivered care, wrapped in the misleadingly titled "Veterans' ACCESS Act." If veterans don't act fast, they will lose the VA health care system they know and depend on.
The bill appears innocuous enough, with aspirations of accountability. But don't be fooled. Hidden in its depths like a ticking time bomb is a provision intended to dismantle the integrated VA health care system faster than you can say "privatization."
Here's their Trojan horse sneak attack: In response to struggles with addiction and mental health challenges many veterans face, the bill would allow unfettered access to outpatient private treatment without any VA authorization or referral. No questions asked. No guardrails whatsoever. The VA would simply pay the bills from its limited coffer. That's phase one.
Then, after three years, this arrangement is intended to encompass all medical care, fundamentally transforming the VA's primary role
(Excerpt) Read more at military.com ...
Numerous veterans on the forum who may or may not use the VA for medical care and we all have our opinions on their services, positive or negative.
I can only say what can no longer be afforded will not be afforded.
All American soldiers currently serving or with an honorable discharge should be able to get free treatment from ANY hospital in the USA for as long as they need or require treatment. IMHO
The VA System has outlived it’s usefulness and become an expensive hindrance to Veteran’s healthcare.
Keep enough admin staff to evaluate applications and pay benefits.
Issue a card so authorized Vets can get care anywhere, anytime.
I (and my late wife) are Army retirees who have never used the VA. We had all of our limbs, eyesight, etc and didn’t want to take limited resources from those who don’t.
Would this not offer vets the opportunity to access what is often better care, if not wound or otherwise veteran-related?
I’ve been a victim of the VA system for 48 years. I’ve received substandard care for 46 of those years. The VA hospital in Madison, Wisconsin has been very good. Can’t say the same for Biloxi, MS, Jackson, MS, New Orleans, Tampa-St Pete, or Honolulu.
I retired after 40 years in healthcare. I know good care from not so good care. I’ve long believed a two or three tiered veterans insurance program would be a cost effective solution to a bloated under preforming VA.
Don’t believe all the hype in the article.
Bttt.
5.56mm
Give them free access to the same health care plan the Congresscritters vote for themselves.
As someone who’s not a veteran, I can only rely on stories from those who are. No change can be worse than the treatment in the past few decades. I’ve heard everything from neglect and physical abuse to electrified plumbing. It sounds like a living nightmare.
I talked to a nurse at the local VA clinic and asked if her clinic was getting anyone terminated under DOGE. She said no, nothing has come down yet.
The local clinic refers just about any of my ailments to civilian clinics. The only thing it really does is annual physicals and med prescriptions.
I am also going to speak up and say that Congresscritters free healthcare should end after their terms end. No more free stuff because those people come out of there multi millionaires.
They can pay their own way.
I have used the VA hospital in Biloxi and so far I haven’t had any complaints. For major issues/surgeries they have referred me to outside sources through their Community Care network. However, I don’t use the VA as my primary medical care as I do have Medicare/Tricare for Life.
I am a female veteran who was on active duty for three years and in the active reserve for eight years until I stopped due to having children and not wanting to be away from them for ADT in the summer. Anyway, I could never access squat from the VA, so I don’t know who is able to.
VA health care has been and still is a joke. Every week I hear my fellow veterans gripe about the crappy care they receive, if they even receive any at all. After almost 32 years in uniform I retired with no service connected issues, so I don’t need nor want anything to do with the VA. I get much better health care from my PCP, who has his own practice. I see the same providers year in and year out and not someone who’s there today and gone tomorrow and graduated in the bottom half of his class. The VA is just like Britain’s NHS...bloated and unresponsive.
Unfortunately it does not work that way. It’s all political. In the 90’s I was on VA health care. The Clinton admin came out with a policy where only those with minimal income could get it. I was then kicked off VA health care. I could not get back on again until Trump’s first term.
I’m on VA health care now, but keep a very expensive BC & BS policy as plan B if the rats ever decide I don’t deserve it again.
Would it be better from both a budget and medical quality perspective to eliminate VA medical benefits and facilities and replace them with Medicare and/or Medicare Advantage? By ‘budget’ I mean spending less taxpayer dollars Medicare and/or Medicare Advantage to receive equal or better benefits as compared to VA Tricare & VA Hospitals?
“I don’t use the VA as my primary medical care as I do have Medicare/Tricare for Life.”
If you have Medicare and Tricare for Life, why would you use the VA at all? That’s not a challenging question. I’m just curious because I have those, too, and have never considered going to the VA.
Regarding comments upto RedFreedom,
Medical issue’s are not easy but VA has been good since I started 1 yr ago.
Trump won’t gut it.IMHO.
.
God Bless Our Veterans!
with Trump on veteran’s affairs, assume the best and ignore the rest
the left are just crazy monkey’s flinging poop now
I’m a retired Vet. I can count on three fingers the times I walked into a VA facility. I use TRICARE like all retirees. Folks who use the VA generally aren’t retirees, they’re the folks who didn’t retire, but were injured or wounded an active duty. We definitely need to take care of them.
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