Veterans health care study sparks partisan clash in Congress
WASHINGTON — Democrats and Republicans on the House Veterans Affairs Committee were divided Wednesday over the future of veterans health care as the panel heard testimony on a highly-critical study that suggested a complete overhaul of the VA medical system.
The hearing got off to a tense start as committee Chairman Jeff Miller, R-Fla., complained that testimony submitted by the Veterans Administration offered “little concrete detail” of the actions it planned to take in response to the more than 4,000-page report by an independent commission.
“Unfortunately, the testimony we are hearing today repeats a lot of the same talking points we have heard in the past,” he said, including erroneous statements that a Republican-approved budget for 2016 cut VA health funding.
Miller said the sweeping study — done at a cost of $68 million — found a broken system in need of “nothing short of a top-to-bottom transformation.”
Democrats offered a different perspective — acknowledging the problems exist but suggesting that Congress shares in the blame for shortchanging VA health care.
Rep. Dina Titus, D-Nev., who sits on the panel, pointed to a bill passed last week that provides $625 million to complete construction of a $1.7 billion VA medical campus in Aurora, Colo., by raiding other VA programs including “recruitment and retention” funds used to compete with private hospitals.
“One of the problems we have seen (in Las Vegas) is we cannot hire enough doctors — much less the best and brightest,” she said. “I talked to the head of the medical facility in Las Vegas and he said they had run out of this money. They need more money not less.”
In addition to the emergency room having been understaffed, it’s undergoing a $16 million expansion because it was inadequate when the medical center opened in 2012. When completed, it will add 14 beds to the 11 already there.
Titus said Congress shares in the blame for failing veterans because it has failed to approve annual spending bills — leaving the VA health system to operate on “continuing resolutions” that provide short-term funding at current spending levels. As a result, she said, the VA operates from crisis to crisis.
VA Secretary Robert McDonald said he would “hate to predict a crisis” but noted that the most recent 10-week budget extension provided no additional funding for treatment of veterans with hepatitis C, which helped create the budget crisis in the fiscal year that just ended.
“That demand for the hepatitis C drug is not going to abate because suddenly it is Oct. 1. So, the continuing resolution is obviously insufficient to be able to continue on the path that we were on,” McDonald said.
The Arizona Republic reported in September that the VA was moving to outsource care for up to 180,000 veterans who have hepatitis C, as patient loads have surged and funds have dried up. Patients are treated with a recently-approved drug that is highly effective in curing HCV infection but costs between $50,000 to $100,000 per patient.
Outside the hearing, Titus said Democrats and Republicans have polar views on the mission ahead for VA medical centers.
“The big agenda for Republicans is to privatize as much of it as possible,” she said. “They are talking about sending more veterans into the private sector and limiting VA to what it does best. That is the road they are going down and I think it is a big mistake.”
As to the North Las Vegas center, Titus said there have been problems hiring medical staff for the new facility.
“We didn’t have a gynecologist for a long time. We were short in the emergency room for a long time. And, for some specialists you have to go to Los Angeles to get that sort of treatment,” she said. “We are having a hard time recruiting and if you can’t offer some incentives to those doctors you can’t get doctors in.”
The Southern Nevada veterans medical center, which opened in North Las Vegas three years ago at a cost of $1 billion, has been plagued by long waits and canceled appointments blamed in part on a rising tide of veterans moving to the area coupled with a shortage of doctors to care for them.
Review-Journal writer Keith Rogers contributed to this report. Contact Peter Urban at purban@reviewjournal.com or at 202-783-1760.
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