What's New
| VA Secretary Pressed by Senator on High Percentage of Wrongly Denied Benefit Claims |
March 16, 2010, Washington, DC (CQ Politics) - A leading Republican senator on Tuesday asked Veterans Affairs Secretary Eric Shinseki to explain why so many veterans’ benefit claims are wrongly denied, resulting in a high rate of reversal on appeal. |
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| Profile of New Veterans' Courts in New York Times |
Defendants Fresh From War Find Service Counts in Court - VCS Supports Veterans' Courts March 15, 2010, Charleston, West Virginia (New York Times) — When Judge Robert C. Chambers handed down Timothy Oldani’s federal sentence for selling stolen military equipment on eBay, he gave the former Marine a break. |
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| Presdent Obama Donated $250,000 of Nobel Prize Money to Fisher House |
March 11, 2010, Washington, DC (New York Times) - President Obama made good on his promise to give his $1.4 million Nobel Prize money to charity, releasing the names on Thursday of the organizations that will benefit. |
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| Philanthropist Bobby Willis to Build New $3.3 Billion Hospital for VA in Farmington, NM for Rural and Native American Veterans |
Proposed state-of-the-art Kirtland veterans clinic could provide as many as 8,000 jobs March 14, 2010, Farmington, New Mexico (Farmington Daily Times) — A proposed veterans complex in Kirtland centered around a new hospital, backed by a wealthy entrepreneur and costing an estimated $3.3 billion promises to bring state-of-the-art medicine and other benefits to veterans, as well as 8,000 jobs to the local economy. |
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| Dr. Haley at UTSW Presents Compelling Brain Images Showing Gulf War Illness |
VCS Asks VA: Since UTSW Research Remains Vital to Understanding Gulf War Illness, Then Why Did a Handful of VA Staff in Washington Impede UTSW Contract and Then End Funding for UTSW? March 9, 2010, Salt Lake City, Utah (Science News) - Nearly two decades after vets began returning from the Middle East complaining of Gulf War Syndrome, the federal government has yet to formally accept that their vague jumble of symptoms constitutes a legitimate illness. Here, at the Society of Toxicology annual meeting, yesterday, researchers rolled out a host of brain images – various types of magnetic-resonance scans and brain-wave measurements – that they say graphically and unambiguously depict Gulf War Syndrome. |
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Bayh Seeks Inspector General Review of Toxin Complaints
Written by Libby Creagh
Thursday, 13 August 2009 09:19
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August 12, 2009 - Indiana Sen. Evan Bayh and four other Democratic senators have asked the Pentagon's inspector general to review the Army's response to the potential exposure of Indiana National Guardsmen to a deadly chemical in Iraq.
The senators said they believe the conduct of the Army and military contractor KBR may have caused hundreds of U.S. troops to be exposed to dangerous levels of cancer-causing sodium dichromate. Former KBR employees have said that workers and soldiers, including Indiana Guard members, were exposed to sodium dichromate at an Iraqi water pumping plant that was being repaired in 2003. Sodium dichromate was used at the site as an anti-corrosive. Some of the guardsmen are suing KBR, which has said it acted properly. The senators said the review done by an advisory committee to the secretary of defense and by the U.S. Army Center for Health Promotion and Preventive Medicine "may have been deeply flawed." The issues the senators want the inspector general to review include whether the Army failed to clear sodium dichromate from the facility before authorizing KBR to enter the site and whether the Army responded adequately when soldiers began experience health problems. "We know that multiple failures by contractor KBR lead to this exposure," said Sen. Byron Dorgan, D-N.D. "But it is also becoming clear that the Army's multiple failures resulted in soldiers not being warned about the contamination, not being provided personal protective gear, not having their symptoms taken seriously, and not being tested in a timely manner." The Defense Health Board, an advisory committee to the secretary of defense that provides independent advice, has said the Army correctly concluded that Indiana National Guardsmen were not overexposed to the toxin.
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