Friday, June 13, 2014

Veterans know how long has this been going on

While these studies were not very good and time proved many of what is claimed wrong, it shows how long these issues have been going on.

Vietnam Veterans and PTSD
Findings from the National Vietnam Veterans' Readjustment Study
Jennifer L. Price, PhD
Introduction
The National Vietnam Veterans' Readjustment Study (NVVRS) was conducted in response to a congressional mandate in 1983 for an investigation of Posttraumatic Stress Disorder (PTSD) and other postwar psychological problems among Vietnam Veterans (Kulka et al., 1990a, Kulka et al., 1990b). The purpose of the NVVRS was to obtain accurate prevalence rates of postwar psychological problems in order to serve the needs of the nation's Veterans. The NVVRS used a multimethod assessment approach (e.g., self-report, clinical interview) to study representative national samples of Vietnam Veterans and their peers. Participants were grouped according to their involvement in the Vietnam war, including Vietnam theater Veterans (i.e., men and women who served on active duty in Vietnam, Laos, or Cambodia), Vietnam era Veterans (i.e., men and women who served on active duty during the Vietnam era but not in the Vietnam theater), and non-Veterans or civilian counterparts (i.e., men and women who did not serve in the military during the Vietnam era).
Vietnam Veterans and Agent Orange
Yet Vietnam veterans are still suffering, waiting for claims to be approved and proper help delivered and they are still taking their own lives.
Vietnam veterans exposed to Agent Orange and other herbicides In 1979, Congress commissioned a large-scale epidemiological study of . Over the next four years, the VA examined about 200,000 Vietnam veterans for medical problems they claimed stemmed from Agent Orange and other herbicides.

Also in 1979, veterans filed a class-action lawsuit against the companies that had manufactured Agent Orange.

Many were not satisfied with their exams and medical care, and they felt the VA was ignoring their claims. In 1981, Congress expanded health-care coverage to Vietnam veterans exposed to Agent Orange. The next year, 1983, the Department of Health and Human Services released its first report showing a link between Agent Orange exposure and soft-tissue sarcoma.

In 1984, the class-action lawsuit was settled. Although the companies did not have to accept blame, they were ordered to pay $180 million to the veterans.

Gulf War Veterans and Gulf War Syndrome
Yet veterans are still suffering, waiting for claims to be approved and treatment delivered, and dying while waiting as they have for decades but no one remembers them or all their years of suffering.
Gulf War Veterans November 7, 1997 "Committed to the Committee of the Whole House on the State of the Union 105th Congress"
Since the Gulf War ended in 1991, there has been a growing number of reports of chronic illnesses among the nearly 700,000 United States troops who served in Saudi Arabia, Kuwait, and Iraq. Although the illnesses are most common among reservists and National Guardsmen who served in the Gulf, full-time active-duty soldiers have also complained about various maladies.

Yet no one remembers the first veterans fighting or what they came home with as well as being forgotten by the press as if they never went. They are still waiting and dying. As much as it is easier for the general public to think all of this is new, it is far from it.

Congress is playing the commercial game of pretending they were not part of the problem but as we know, when veterans are getting the run around, they call their congressman or woman to complain. For any of these members of congress to pretend they had no clue all along is sinful. There is no excuse for any of it.

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