Bad Service: Vet treatment needs work

ONE-QUARTER of 1 percent.

That's the sanctioned amount of time - one day out of the year - we are supposed to be concerned about veterans.

This is that day, and a good time to reflect on how little else we give them. Especially compared to the level of concern they show us when they risk their lives and well-being to fight for us.

The state of veterans' affairs in this country has seen some improvement in the last year. But considering that our recent treatment of vets has been shameful, we are hardly out of the woods.

Still, Congress deserves much credit for improving the lives of veterans. In August, it passed an expanded GI Bill that would increase educational benefits to veterans.

Congress also fully funded the VA, and passed the biggest increase in spending on vet health care in over 70 years.

Yet the horrors of Walter Reed Army Hospital came to light less than two years ago. Its decrepit, overcrowded conditions became a symbol of our nation's disregard for those who fight on our behalf. And VA hospitals around the country that didn't get the level of coverage that the Walter Reed scandal got are still struggling to provide the proper degree of care to wounded and ailing vets.

This year, there have been increasing concerns about vets' mental-health needs, with many returning from Iraq and Afghanistan with depression and post-traumatic stress disorder. Earlier this year, two veterans groups sued the Department of Veterans Affairs over the lack of more immediate response to such problems.

Faster and better treatment might decrease the high rates of vet suicides, estimated to be 1,000 a month out of the 5.6 million treated by the VA.

The economy, which is dealing harsh blows to all, can hit veterans especially hard when they lose their jobs or their homes.

In fact, a shocking study from the National Alliance to End Homelessness last year estimated that veterans make up 26 percent of the nation's homeless. That situation has since improved somewhat, but the numbers - 154,000 vets living on the streets - is still incomprehensible.

One veterans' group, the Iraq Afghanistan Veterans of America (IAVA) just issued a to-do list for President-elect Barack Obama, calling on him to pay close attention to vets' affairs. The call includes the need to fund veterans' health care one year in advance, so the VA budget doesn't require hospitals and clinics to ration care.

IAVA also is pushing the Department of Defense to resolve whether and how GI bill benefits will be transferable from service members to their families. And it wants the president-elect to recruit more mental-health professionals. The president does what he can, but it's time we all did more. IAVA points out that community members can volunteer at local VA hospitals or local chapters of the National Guard. And you can join the IAVA mailing list to be alerted to local veterans' events (www.iava.org).

Imagine being plucked from your life and loved ones, and shipped across the world to fight in a dangerous war. Then consider how you'd want to be treated when - and if - you return.

We all have a responsibility to make sure that treatment is honorable, and the concern lasts longer than a day. *