| Code Talkers Recognition Act: The House approved a measure this week to award the Congressional Gold Medal to all Native American Code Talkers for their contributions to U.S. victories in World War I and World War II. Previously, only Navajo Nation Code Talkers were awarded this medal. The measure, introduced by Rep. Dan Boren (D-OK) and co-sponsored by 300 members of Congress, was passed unanimously by voice vote and will be sent to the Senate for consideration. The bill is supported by a VFW resolution that calls on Congress to identify and award them the Congressional Gold Medal all Native Americans who served as Code Talkers. ### |
| DoD Revises PURPLE HEART Eligibility Criteria to Allow Award to POWs Who Die in Captivity The Department of Defense announced today it has expanded the PURPLE HEART Eligibility criteria allowing Prisoners-Of-war who died in captivity to receive the Award. The revised department policy presumes, for service members who die in captivity as a qualifying Prisoner-Of-War, that their death was the "result of enemy action," or the result of wounds incurred "in action with the enemy" during capture, or as a result of wounds incurred as a "result of enemy action" during capture, unless compelling evidence is presented to the contrary. The revised policy allows retroactive Award of the Purple Heart to qualifying Prisoners-Of-War since Dec. 7, 1941. Posthumous Award will be made to the deceased service member's representative, as designated by the secretary of the military department concerned, upon application to that military department. Each military department will publish application procedures and ensure they are accessible by the general public. Family members with questions may contact the services: Army: Military Awards Branch, (703) 325-8700; Navy: Navy Personnel Command, Retired Records Section, (314) 592-1150; Air Force: Air Force Personnel Center, (800) 616-3775; Marine Corps: Military Awards Branch, (703) 784-9340. For further information, media representatives should contact Eileen Lainez, (703) 695-3895, eileen.lainez@osd.mil. |
ACCOMACK— Veterans who were unable to complete their high school education may be eligible to receive an Honorary High School Diploma. The Virginia Department of Veterans Services and the Virginia Employment Commission are accepting applications from veterans for Honorary High School Diplomas. To qualify, the veteran must have served in the military during World War II (1941-1946), Korean Conflict (1950-1955), or in country in Vietnam (1961-1975). Applications for diplomas will be accepted until July 25, 2008. There is no charge for the diploma. A graduation ceremony honoring veterans who receive an Honorary High School Diploma is planned for August 16, 2008 at Nandua High School in Onley, Virginia. For further information, contact Wendy Ainsworth or Jamie LeCates with the Virginia Department of Veterans Services at 757-787-5862 or Paul Neal with the Virginia Employment Commission at 757-302-2029 |
RESOLUTION NO. 018 EXTEND ELIGIBILITY FOR VETERANS’ MORTGAGE LIFE INSURANCE TO SERVICE- CONNECTED VETERANS RATED PERMANENTLY AND TOTALLY DISABLED WHEREAS, Veterans’ Mortgage Life Insurance is presently available to veterans entitled to the special adapted Housing Award under Section 2101 (a) of title 38, United States Code; and WHEREAS, service-connected veterans rated as Permanently and Totally Disabled cannot obtain mortgage life insurance through commercial insurance companies; and WHEREAS, their widows and dependents must bear an undue hardship upon the death of such veterans; NOW THEREFORE, BE IT RESOLVED that the Disabled American Veterans in National Convention assembled in New Orleans, Louisiana, August 11–14, 2007, seeks the enactment of legislation which would extend Veterans’ Mortgage Life Insurance to service-connected veterans who are rated as permanently and totally disabled. >>>>>>>>>>>>>>>><<<<<<<<<<<<<<<< |
DENVER - The Army's top medical officer says commanders are looking to their counterparts in the Air Force and in civilian agencies for ways to cope with an alarming increase in suicides. "We work real closely with the Veterans Administration, who have for many years taken the lead in this," Lt. Gen. Eric B. Schoomaker, the Army's surgeon general, said Wednesday in a telephone interview. "We've also looked across the services and at other models that have been more successful than our own." The Army's suicide rate was 18.1 per 100,000 last year, the highest since the service started keeping records in 1980. It was 9.8 just five years earlier. The U.S. civilian rate is 19.5 per 100,000. Leading factors behind soldier suicides are troubled personal relationships; legal, financial and work problems; and repeated deployments and longer tours in Afghanistan and Iraq, the Army says. Schoomaker said the Army has redoubled its prevention efforts and looked outside for new models, especially to the Air Force, which he said successfully encouraged support systems to reduce suicides. The Army's program includes removing the stigma from asking for help, encouraging soldiers to look after each other and a campaign called ACE, for Ask, Care and Escort. "We ask that people extend themselves to a fellow soldier or family member that may be suffering," Schoomaker said. "We ask that you make the effort to ask, 'Are you in trouble?'" Offering care may be as simple as keeping a weapon out of a troubled soldier's reach, he said. Soldiers and families should then escort the soldier to a medical facility. Schoomaker acknowledged that encouraging troubled soldiers to ask for help requires a cultural change. "We are an Army that has historically been associated with strength and being impervious to threats to the human psyche and the body, and of course that's a myth," he said. He hopes to use the Army's "warrior ethos" to get soldiers to look out for one another's mental health. "It's an extension of our warrior ethos that no soldier is ever left behind," he said. Schoomaker said the Army will analyze individual suicides and suicide attempts, police reports and incidents of misconduct as well as the overall numbers of suicides and attempts to see if the program is working. ___ On the Net: Army suicide prevention sites: http://tinyurl.com/6z7zgx http://tinyurl.com/66o8yk |
| September 23, 2008 VA announces ALS as a presumptive services-connected illiness VA Secretary Establishes "ALS" as a Presumptive Compensable Illness Cites Association between Military Service and Later Development of ALS WASHINGTON (Sept. 23, 2008) - Veterans with Amyotrophic Lateral Sclerosis (ALS) may receive badly-needed support for themselves and their families after the Department of Veterans Affairs (VA) announced today that ALS will become a presumptively compensable illness for all veterans with 90 days or more of continuously active service in the military. "Veterans are developing ALS in rates higher than the general population, and it was appropriate to take action," Secretary of Veterans Affairs Dr. James B. Peake said. Secretary Peake based his decision primarily on a November 2006 report by the National Academy of Sciences' Institute of Medicine (IOM) on the association between active-duty service and ALS. "We are extremely grateful to Secretary Peake, Congressman Henry Brown and Senator Lindsey Graham for standing on the side of veterans with ALS across the country," said Gary Leo, president and CEO of The ALS Association. "Thanks to their leadership, veterans with ALS will receive the benefits and care they need, when they need them. Thanks to their efforts, no veteran with ALS will ever be left behind." The report, titled Amyotrophic Lateral Sclerosis in Veterans: Review of the Scientific Literature, analyzed numerous previous studies on the issue and concluded that "there is limited and suggestive evidence of an association between military service and later development of ALS." "ALS is a disease that progresses rapidly, once it is diagnosed," the Secretary explained. "There simply isn't time to develop the evidence needed to support compensation claims before many veterans become seriously ill. My decision will make those claims much easier to process, and for them and their families to receive the compensation they have earned through their service to our nation." ALS, also called Lou Gehrig's disease, is a neuromuscular disease that affects about 20,000 to 30,000 people of all races and ethnicities in the United States, is often relentlessly progressive, and is almost always fatal. ALS causes degeneration of nerve cells in the brain and spinal cord that leads to muscle weakness, muscle atrophy, and spontaneous muscle activity. Currently, the cause of ALS is unknown, and there is no effective treatment. The new interim final regulation applies to all applications for benefits received by VA on or after September 23, 2008, or that are pending before VA, the United States Court of Appeals for Veterans Claims, or the United States Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit on that date. VA will work to identify and contact veterans with ALS, including those whose claims for ALS were previously denied, through direct mailings and other outreach programs. To view the entire regulation published in the Federal Register today, go to: www.federalregister.gov/OFRUpload/OFRData/2008-21998_PI.pdf. For more information on VA's disability compensation program, go to www.va.gov or contact 1-800-827-1000. To unsubscribe from this list, or to update your name or e-mail address, please visit the following Internet address: http://www.va.gov/opa/pressrel/opalist_listserv.cfm ### |
| Disabled American Veterans, Stonewall Jackson, Chapter 9, Winchester, Virginia |
| Recent VA News Releases http://www.va.gov/opa/pressrel VA Sends Latest Gulf War Illness Report to IOM for Review WASHINGTON (Dec. 1, 2008) -- The Department of Veterans Affairs (VA) has sent the October 2008 report from the VA Research Advisory Committee on Gulf War Veterans' Illnesses to the National Academy of Sciences' Institute of Medicine (IOM) for review and recommendations. The October report from the advisory committee identified potential causes for -- and asserted that research supports the existence of -- a multi-symptom condition resulting from service in the 1990 - 1991 Gulf War, which the committee identified as Gulf War Illness (GWI). Because VA has traditionally and by law relied upon IOM for independent and credible reviews of the science behind these particular veterans' health issues, Secretary of Veterans Affairs Dr. James B. Peake has asked IOM to review the advisory committee's report before VA officially responds to the report's conclusions. "I appreciate the committee's work on this report, and I am eager to see the results of further independent study into their findings," Peake said. "Of course, VA will continue to provide the care and benefits our Gulf War veterans have earned through their service, as we have for more than a decade." VA has long recognized conditions, granted benefits and provided health care to Gulf War veterans suffering from a broad range of symptoms, even though these conditions have not been scientifically recognized as a specific disease or injury or GWI. These include chronic fatigue, persistent rashes, hair loss, headaches, muscle pain, joint pain, neurologic symptoms, neuropsychological symptoms (such as memory loss), respiratory system symptoms, sleep disturbances, gastrointestinal symptoms, cardiovascular symptoms, abnormal weight loss and menstrual disorders. |
| GI Bill Carries Different Eligibility, Benefits By Samantha L. Quigley American Forces Press Service WASHINGTON, Feb. 2, 2009 - A series of educational assistance programs administered by the Veterans Affairs Department, commonly called the GI Bill, have helped servicemembers pursue post-secondary learning for decades. Soon, another program will be added to the mix: The Post-9/11 Veterans Education Bill will be available to qualified individuals Aug. 1. "We previously administered four major education programs before this bill came along," Keith M. Wilson, VA's education service director, said. "The new Post-9/11 GI Bill has different eligibility criteria [and] pays for different types of training." The new GI Bill provides three (3) separate types of benefit payments to those who entered the military on or after Sept. 10, 2001, and have at least 90 days of active service. 1. The first type of payment covers tuition and fees equal to what each state's most expensive state-run school charges for in-state, undergraduate study. 2. In addition, an allowance based on the Defense Department's basic housing allowance for an E-5 with dependents is available as a benefit paid monthly, Wilson said. The housing allowance's dollar amount depends on the location of the school the servicemember or veteran is attending, he added. 3. The third benefit is a stipend of up to $1,000 a year for books and supplies. "Now, each of those payments is subject to the amount of active duty an individual has," Wilson said. Eligible people with 36 or more months of active duty will receive 100% percent of the three payments, he said. Those with less than 36 months of active service will receive a prorated amount. For example, Wilson said, someone with 90 days to six months of active service qualifies for 40 percent of each of the three types of payments. The benefits increase with an individual's amount of active service, and extend to National Guardsmen and reservists who have at least 90 days of active service. "Previously the Guard and reserve members didn't really have a stake in the GI Bill per se," he said. "Now, we have one program that covers both the Active Duty and the Guard and Reserves." For those who incur out-of-state tuition, attend a private school, or want to pursue graduate studies but find their tuition and fees above the cap set by the VA, there's the Yellow Ribbon Program. "The Yellow Ribbon Program is a sub-element of the Post-9/11 GI Bill," Wilson said. "The ... Program allows schools to enter into an agreement with VA by which the school will waive up to half of the difference of their tuition and fees charges and what the cap is for that state, and VA will match the amount that the school waives. "It's basically a supplemental amount of tuition and fees that would be payable to the school," he added. Wilson said he thinks the voluntary supplemental program has been well received by schools. He cautioned, however, that the VA still has steps to take before any formal agreements between any institution of higher learning and the VA can take place, including finalizing regulations and setting tuition caps. "So no school, public or private, that would be interested in the Yellow Ribbon program really has enough information yet to make [the decision to participate]," he said. It remains to be seen, Wilson said, what effect the country's current economic situation may have on the Yellow Ribbon program. "The important thing to remember is that the Yellow Ribbon program is available to all schools," he said. "[Speculation about] whether or not schools' financial situations are going to impact their participation or not is a little bit premature. They don't have all the information they need from us yet." More information on the Post-9/11 GI Bill, eligibility, and how this new bill could affect those with service prior to Sept. 10, 2001, is available on the Veterans Affairs GI Bill site or by calling 1-888-GIBILL-1 toll-free. Along with answers to frequently asked questions, visitors to the site will find a link that will allow them to receive updates on the new GI Bill via e-mail as they become available. |