02-24-2022, 10:40 PM
42% of the 2,126 Post-9/11 Vets Having It Have Been Denied
While traumatic brain injuries and post-traumatic stress disorder have been called the "signature
wounds" of the Iraq and Afghanistan wars, affecting nearly half a million troops, thousands of
veterans also have been diagnosed with diseases possibly connected to environmental hazards
and toxic waste. Hundreds are fighting or have succumbed to glioblastoma, the most common
form of brain cancer, striking roughly 12,000 Americans each year. The few studies done on
military personnel and veterans to determine whether they have been getting glioblastoma at
higher rates than the general population have been inconclusive.
But glioblastoma is the third most common cause of cancer-related death in the active-duty
population, behind colon cancer and leukemia. And among post-9/11 veterans who deployed to
Iraq, Afghanistan and elsewhere, glioblastoma occurs at a rate 26% higher than that found in the
general population, according to calculations based on Department of Veterans Affairs and
National Institutes of Health data. Most of the stricken veterans and their families believe their
illnesses were caused by military environmental exposures. Yet 42% of the 2,126 post-9/11
veterans who have developed brain cancer have been denied access to health care and disability
compensation by the VA. The VA doesn’t single out glioblastoma, which accounts for about 80%
of all metastatic brain tumors, for claims purposes.
For veterans and family members dealing with the emotional and physical toll of battling brain
cancer, the added burden of quarreling with the VA over benefits can be too much. "We spent the
first year fighting the disease and the second year fighting VA," said Amy Antioho, widow of
former Army Capt. Peter Antioho, a West Point graduate who died of glioblastoma on Sept. 27,
2020. "It should not be this way." Antioho spends her days working on a farm and caring for the
couple's five-year-old son, Mark, who has come to know his father through notes from friends
and family recollections.
She tries to focus on the memories before cancer, but Peter's last days, spent in hospice, loom
large. She had to shelter him from nurses who kept telling him he would eventually get better and
go home. She remembers lying next to Peter, listening to the soundtrack of “Les Miserables,”
holding him just as Marius cradles a dying Eponine. She relives the moment she gave him
permission to go, trying to free him from the responsibility of caring for his family. She misses
her handsome soldier. "I just remember him saying the burn pit was going to kill him someday,"
Antioho said.
According to the NIH, the rate of glioblastoma in the general population, when accounting for
age, is roughly 3.2 cases per 100,000 people, with the median age of onset at 64. But according
to the VA, among post-9/11 veterans who deployed and have VA health care, the rate of brain
cancer – mostly glioblastomas -- averaged 5.2 cases per 100,000 per year from 2015 to 2019 in a
population in which nearly half are ages 30 to 39. The rates among Vietnam and Persian Gulf vets
are elevated as well – 6.2 per 100,000 per year between 2015 and 2019, according to the
department.
The VA automatically grants benefits to service members diagnosed with brain cancer on
active duty and to any veteran who worked with radiation while serving, or if they develop the
disease within a year of discharge. All others must file a disability compensation claim. Since
2002, more than 10,000 veterans with brain cancer or surviving family members of veterans from
the Vietnam, Persian Gulf and post-9/11 eras have had varying degrees of success. The VA told
Military.com and Public Health Watch on Nov. 5 that the claims approval rate was just 16.7% for
post-9/11 veterans with brain cancer, while it was over 70% and 80%, respectively, for Vietnam
and Persian Gulf War era veterans.
When reached for comment about this investigation days before publication, the VA revised
the data, indicating that the approval rate for post-9/11 veterans was much higher, 58%, but was
much lower, 31%, for Persian Gulf War-era vets. Officials said the 16.7% approval rate for post-
9/11 veterans was determined using a “dated system.” By utilizing a new algorithm that more
accurately sorted the veterans into their period of service the approval rates rose for post-9/11
veterans and dropped for Persian Gulf-era vets. “Because they used the wrong method, they were
missing some Gulf War veterans completely, and then hadn't appropriately segmented them into
Gulf War One and post 9/11,” explained Ken Smith, acting executive director of the Office of
Performance Analysis and Integrity at the Veterans Benefits Administration. “This is the correct
way of doing it.”
Regardless of classification, just about half of veterans who served since August 1990 and
developed brain cancer have had their claims denied. This, say veterans’ advocates, is
unacceptable. "People are dying, and to deny them the right to health care, to deny [compensation]
to their survivors who are spending their last minutes with their loved ones, it's criminal and
insulting," said Rosie Torres, co-founder of Burn Pits 360, a nonprofit in Robstown, Texas, that
supports veterans who believe they were sickened by environmental exposures. There is some
hope this year that the path could get easier. The VA announced in November that it is reviewing
whether some cancers and a rare lung disorder should be fast-tracked for disability benefits.
The department has not published a complete list of the cancers under consideration. But
veterans with glioblastoma and families of those who died from the disease believe it should be.
They note that the commander-in-chief's son, former Army National Guard Maj. Beau Biden,
died of glioblastoma in 2015. Biden had deployed to Iraq in 2008 and worked as a civilian near a
burn pit in Kosovo. "We know now you don't want to live underneath a smokestack where
carcinogens are coming out of it," President Joe Biden told Judy Woodruff on PBS NewsHour in
2018, comparing factory pollution to burn pits.
Note: Refer to https://www.military.com/daily-news/2022...efits.html to read more on this subject
While traumatic brain injuries and post-traumatic stress disorder have been called the "signature
wounds" of the Iraq and Afghanistan wars, affecting nearly half a million troops, thousands of
veterans also have been diagnosed with diseases possibly connected to environmental hazards
and toxic waste. Hundreds are fighting or have succumbed to glioblastoma, the most common
form of brain cancer, striking roughly 12,000 Americans each year. The few studies done on
military personnel and veterans to determine whether they have been getting glioblastoma at
higher rates than the general population have been inconclusive.
But glioblastoma is the third most common cause of cancer-related death in the active-duty
population, behind colon cancer and leukemia. And among post-9/11 veterans who deployed to
Iraq, Afghanistan and elsewhere, glioblastoma occurs at a rate 26% higher than that found in the
general population, according to calculations based on Department of Veterans Affairs and
National Institutes of Health data. Most of the stricken veterans and their families believe their
illnesses were caused by military environmental exposures. Yet 42% of the 2,126 post-9/11
veterans who have developed brain cancer have been denied access to health care and disability
compensation by the VA. The VA doesn’t single out glioblastoma, which accounts for about 80%
of all metastatic brain tumors, for claims purposes.
For veterans and family members dealing with the emotional and physical toll of battling brain
cancer, the added burden of quarreling with the VA over benefits can be too much. "We spent the
first year fighting the disease and the second year fighting VA," said Amy Antioho, widow of
former Army Capt. Peter Antioho, a West Point graduate who died of glioblastoma on Sept. 27,
2020. "It should not be this way." Antioho spends her days working on a farm and caring for the
couple's five-year-old son, Mark, who has come to know his father through notes from friends
and family recollections.
She tries to focus on the memories before cancer, but Peter's last days, spent in hospice, loom
large. She had to shelter him from nurses who kept telling him he would eventually get better and
go home. She remembers lying next to Peter, listening to the soundtrack of “Les Miserables,”
holding him just as Marius cradles a dying Eponine. She relives the moment she gave him
permission to go, trying to free him from the responsibility of caring for his family. She misses
her handsome soldier. "I just remember him saying the burn pit was going to kill him someday,"
Antioho said.
According to the NIH, the rate of glioblastoma in the general population, when accounting for
age, is roughly 3.2 cases per 100,000 people, with the median age of onset at 64. But according
to the VA, among post-9/11 veterans who deployed and have VA health care, the rate of brain
cancer – mostly glioblastomas -- averaged 5.2 cases per 100,000 per year from 2015 to 2019 in a
population in which nearly half are ages 30 to 39. The rates among Vietnam and Persian Gulf vets
are elevated as well – 6.2 per 100,000 per year between 2015 and 2019, according to the
department.
The VA automatically grants benefits to service members diagnosed with brain cancer on
active duty and to any veteran who worked with radiation while serving, or if they develop the
disease within a year of discharge. All others must file a disability compensation claim. Since
2002, more than 10,000 veterans with brain cancer or surviving family members of veterans from
the Vietnam, Persian Gulf and post-9/11 eras have had varying degrees of success. The VA told
Military.com and Public Health Watch on Nov. 5 that the claims approval rate was just 16.7% for
post-9/11 veterans with brain cancer, while it was over 70% and 80%, respectively, for Vietnam
and Persian Gulf War era veterans.
When reached for comment about this investigation days before publication, the VA revised
the data, indicating that the approval rate for post-9/11 veterans was much higher, 58%, but was
much lower, 31%, for Persian Gulf War-era vets. Officials said the 16.7% approval rate for post-
9/11 veterans was determined using a “dated system.” By utilizing a new algorithm that more
accurately sorted the veterans into their period of service the approval rates rose for post-9/11
veterans and dropped for Persian Gulf-era vets. “Because they used the wrong method, they were
missing some Gulf War veterans completely, and then hadn't appropriately segmented them into
Gulf War One and post 9/11,” explained Ken Smith, acting executive director of the Office of
Performance Analysis and Integrity at the Veterans Benefits Administration. “This is the correct
way of doing it.”
Regardless of classification, just about half of veterans who served since August 1990 and
developed brain cancer have had their claims denied. This, say veterans’ advocates, is
unacceptable. "People are dying, and to deny them the right to health care, to deny [compensation]
to their survivors who are spending their last minutes with their loved ones, it's criminal and
insulting," said Rosie Torres, co-founder of Burn Pits 360, a nonprofit in Robstown, Texas, that
supports veterans who believe they were sickened by environmental exposures. There is some
hope this year that the path could get easier. The VA announced in November that it is reviewing
whether some cancers and a rare lung disorder should be fast-tracked for disability benefits.
The department has not published a complete list of the cancers under consideration. But
veterans with glioblastoma and families of those who died from the disease believe it should be.
They note that the commander-in-chief's son, former Army National Guard Maj. Beau Biden,
died of glioblastoma in 2015. Biden had deployed to Iraq in 2008 and worked as a civilian near a
burn pit in Kosovo. "We know now you don't want to live underneath a smokestack where
carcinogens are coming out of it," President Joe Biden told Judy Woodruff on PBS NewsHour in
2018, comparing factory pollution to burn pits.
Note: Refer to https://www.military.com/daily-news/2022...efits.html to read more on this subject