Sent in by Veterans News and Information Services
WASHINGTON, D.C. - The VA health care system should be among the recipients
of any financial recovery from government litigation against tobacco
companies, two senior lawmakers urged in a letter today to President
Clinton.
In his State of the Union message, President Clinton announced plans to sue
tobacco companies for costs incurred by federal health programs. Congressmen
Bob Stump of Arizona and Lane Evans of Illinois, Chairman and Ranking
Democratic member respectively of the House Committee on Veterans' Affairs,
noted the President's speech did not address the unmet health care needs of
veterans. They urged use of funds recovered in litigation for expanding VA
health care programs.
The Department of Veterans Affairs operates the largest federal health care
system in the country. Stump and Evans pointed out that the VA currently
spends $3 billion of its approximately $17 billion annual health care budget
treating tobacco-related illnesses.
"Mr. President," they wrote, "there is a very high level of concern among
veterans and veterans' advocates regarding the adequacy of VA health care
funding for the future. Funding constraints are forcing VA to shrink health
care staffs, close clinical programs, and abandon plans both for renovating
old, substandard facilities and for meeting long-term care needs of our
aging veteran population."
"With growing health care needs associated with aging," Stump and Evans
wrote, "veterans are increasingly turning to VA for care of chronic health
problems, many involving pulmonary illnesses."
In 1996, according to Stump and Evans, 24,588 veterans were diagnosed and
hospitalized with lung cancer. Their average age was 66.8 years. That same
year, 26,000 veterans averaging 68 years of age received VA hospital care
for chronic bronchitis. Another 9,278 veterans averaging 66 years of age
were treated for emphysema. VA patients with any of these three diseases
consumed more than 315,000 days of hospital care during fiscal year 1996.
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