Leave VA Health Care Alone!

Please pass this article along to any vets you know. It’s infuriating that the privatizers in the Republican party and its supporters (Spit! Kochs!) want to undermine one of the best health systems in this country and they want to do so in the name of their putrid ideology. They may try to dress up their motives in mealy-mouthed “Our veterans deserve better than this” talk, but they really just hate the thought of government-provided services, be it health care or anything else.

I can speak as a vet and say that I’ve had excellent care from the local VA clinic. I’ve been referred to and treated by the major military hospital here in a very timely manner when more care than the clinic could offer was required. I’ve had to wait a few weeks for an appointment, but no more than anyone needs to wait to get an appointment in the private health care “system.” When I had a more urgent need recently I was able to talk to a nurse immediately and was inserted into my doc’s schedule the next day.

I’ve also been referred to an outside doctor through the new VA Choice program. I have a feeling I was a guinea pig, used by my doctor to see how it would work. I had no complaints (I had the recent colonoscopy that way), but I didn’t understand then and don’t understand now why I couldn’t have been sent up the hill to Tripler, where I’d previously had two cancer surgeries through the VA.

Don’t let anyone tell you the VA Health Care system is broken. It isn’t. It has its glitches and flaws as does any large organization, but it works and nearly all of us who use it are happy with it. The Kochs and their allies will trot out people who claim to be vets who’ll whine about how badly they were treated by the VA; be very skeptical.

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