Straining to keep a promise-Backlogs, long waits plague VA Boston Globe-6 page story

[fed-up]

http://www.boston.com/news/nation/articles/2007/03/11/straining_to_keep_a_promise/
Straining to keep a promise
Backlogs, long waits plague VA hospital system
By Charles M. Sennott, Globe Staff | March 11, 2007

...snip

Veterans Affairs is a vast agency that makes a vast promise, one literally etched in bronze at the entrance to its headquarters in Washington -- "To Care for Him Who Shall Have Borne the Battle and for His Widow, and His Orphan."

Much as military planners failed to adequately account for the enormous cost -- in lives, money, and time -- of securing Iraq after toppling Saddam Hussein, the VA failed to plan and sufficiently staff for the wave of casualties, and the kinds of injuries that have flowed from the combat zone.

..snip

A Globe review of hundreds of pages of VA memoranda and planning documents, and interviews with present and former agency officials, legislative analysts, and veterans, shows that the VA planned for a short and relatively bloodless war in Iraq, and then was slow to react when the war dragged on and casualties and other claims mounted from 14,000 in 2003 to a projected total of 206,000 this year.
The backlog of disability claims is up to more than 400,000 by the VA's count and climbing. Wait times to process claims are running nearly seven months, on average -- quicker in some places and much longer in others, as Lennon and other veterans have found. In cases where the extent of disability is disputed and an appeal is filed, resolution can take more than two years.

...snip
"Not only is there proof that they knew of increased demand and did nothing. They knew and were actively trying to conceal it," "said Sullivan, who left the agency in frustration, taking with him a trove of unclassified documents that he provided to the Globe.

more at link

[Doctor_J]

1. The right-wing Congress and WH have spent my grandchildren's money

to fight the war. They wull have to borrow my great-grandchildren's to actually take care of the soldiers. Republicans are filthy, sociopathic subhumans who should be in prison.