A Political Debate On Stress Disorder(As Claims Rise, VA Takes Stock)

The spiraling cost of post-traumatic stress disorder among war veterans has triggered a politically charged debate and ignited fears that the government is trying to limit expensive benefits for emotionally scarred troops returning from Iraq and Afghanistan. In the past five years, the number of veterans receiving compensation for the disorder commonly called PTSD has grown nearly seven times as fast as the number receiving benefits for disabilities in general, according to a report this year by the inspector general of the Department of Veterans Affairs. A total of 215,871 veterans received PTSD benefit payments last year at a cost of $4.3 billion, up from $1.7 billion in 1999 -- a jump of more than 150 percent.

Experts say the sharp increase does not begin to factor in the potential impact of the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan, because the increase is largely the result of Vietnam War vets seeking treatment decades after their combat experiences. Facing a budget crunch, experts within and outside the Veterans Affairs Department are raising concerns about fraudulent claims, wondering whether the structure of government benefits discourages healing, and even questioning the utility and objectivity of the diagnosis itself. "On the one hand, it is good that people are reaching out for help," said Jeff Schrade, communications director for the Senate Veterans Affairs Committee. "At the same time, as more people reach out for help, it squeezes the budget further."

Among the issues being discussed, he said, was whether veterans who show signs of recovery should continue to receive disability compensation: "Whether anyone has the political courage to cut them off -- I don't know that Congress has that will, but we'll see." Much of the debate is taking place out of public sight, including an internal VA meeting in Philadelphia this month. The department has also been in negotiations with the Institute of Medicine over a review of the "utility and objectiveness" of PTSD diagnostic criteria and the validity of screening techniques, a process that could have profound implications for returning soldiers.

The growing national debate over the Iraq war has changed the nature of the discussion over PTSD, some participants said. "It has become a pro-war-versus-antiwar issue," said one VA official who spoke on the condition of anonymity because politics is not supposed to enter the debate. "If we show that PTSD is prevalent and severe, that becomes one more little reason we should stop waging war. If, on the other hand, PTSD rates are low . . . that is convenient for the Bush administration."

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2005/12/26/AR2005122600792.html

Through war, this country has created these disorders, and are now questioning the diagnosis? My bil suffers tremendously from PTSD from VN, and it's only gotten worse, not better.
I fear for the new crop of vets and their families who have to deal with this horror.:-(

work with people who have been damaged by PTSD. It is the effect of war, as Babylonsister wrote, that lasts for decades after the soldier returns home. It has horrid effects, not just on the primary sufferer, but on his or her family. Plenty of family abuse, both physical and emotional, gets heaped on people who live with the PTSD person.
Personally, I think that the people who have been serving in Afghanistan and Iraq have been subjected to even worse PTSD-causing situations than those who served in Vietnam.
The financial price we will pay to help these people cope with the aftermath of the horror they have lived with will be a small one if it prevents even some of the adverse effects we have seen with the Vietnam vets.

combat. Extended tours, jobs and famillies torn asunder. The ever present question that hangs over every death, every wound every hardship; "Why?" The psychological price this country will pay for just this one policy of this piece of shit president George W. Bush is yet to be tallied.

when the effects of those untreated veterans, unable to cope with their past, are fully displayed by their children. This problem is born of, and nurtured by our society.