The Department of Veterans Affairs is not feasible

The special management community quickly mobilized to support the Guild and Morgan. “seals care sealS, I will tell you. I.

Virginia covers the Veterans Health Administration, which treats 9 million former military members at 1,400 clinics and hospitals. The system easily outperforms private hospitals in terms of cleaning, communication and patient satisfaction; last spring, its outpatient clinic had a trust rating of 92. Nevertheless, its recommendation process and qualification criteria remain opaque. (I’ve been in VA care for nearly 20 years, and the best way I can explain is: Ultimately, to some extent, you tend to get the help you need.) Veterans have historically struggled to prove conditions with multiple causes, such as chronic diseases and cancer, related to their military services. How do you know that a specific tumor is caused by contaminated water, heavy metals or waste contaminated combustion pits rather than genetics or random chances? Virginia often rejects disability claims, limiting potential health insurance and compensation. But in 2021, Congress introduced protocol ACT, aims to create a “presumptive” connection between certain diagnoses and military service.

Not everyone supports it protocol Behavior. Some Republicans in Congress have tried to stop it on procedural and budgetary issues, which has sparked strong public outcry. It was adopted in 2022. The following year, the Conservative Heritage Foundation published Project 2025President Trump publicly rejected policy guidelines, but followed many details. It believes that a growing number of veterans are receiving expanded health benefits that “has the potential to overwhelm the VA’s ability to handle new disability claims and adjudicate appeals” that could lead to backlogs and delays. The 2025 project believes that the government can achieve “large cost” by changing its approval standards and retaining benefits only (“full or partial”) to existing claimants. The basic agreement between the United States and military members is that if they suffer injuries, they will be cared for. Architects for the 2025 project now have power in the Trump administration and seem ready to change the terms of the deal.

Under President Biden, Virginia has hired thousands of workers to treat veterans and deal with new claims. But on January 20, the Trump administration laid the foundation for firing many federal employees, and a few weeks later, Virginia rejected its first few thousand workers. Eleven days later, it opened another 1,400. When the VA memo leaked, Doug Collins clarified in March that he tried to fire seven hundred thousand workers instead of eighty. This still accounts for 15% of the institution.

When the Guild developed glioblastoma, Virginia rated him as one hundred percent disabled protocol Take action to assure him of monthly compensation and priority access to medical services. Guilds depend on ongoing family occupations and physical therapy. But after the initial shooting, his numerous rehabilitation appointments suddenly stopped schedules. Morgan called and sent countless emails. She describes herself as a self-appointed intermediary between the VA system in Richmond, Virginia, where the guild gained care and its branches. To arrange a date, she had to find and contact people working in different offices and remind them of their husbands’ needs. However, from February 27 to March 19, the guild did not receive treatment

Morgan looked and irritated as Collins defended the VA cutting. “There is no hiring in the federal government,” he said. “We will make major changes, so we get used to it.” In her near-day conversation with VA workers, some told her that they were worried about their jobs. After a few weeks, on March 18, Virginia finally approved her husband’s treatment.

According to Morgan’s instructions, on May 2, a Virginia worker told her that the Richmond system had lost a lot of schedulers, adding: “It’s a nightmare.” Another told her that planners voluntarily left because the situation was “like this” and “things got bigger and bigger.” (February, Richmond, Virginia, by Doge The authorization has terminated dozens of employees, from housekeeping to surgical services. There were no planners among them, and the federal judge then ordered them to be rehired. )

Today, Morgan is a full-time nursing staff at the Guild. She estimates she spends about 25 hours a week on health-related administrative tasks, and she teaches half a time: “Besides the physical condition of care, prepare all meals, take care of nutritional needs, cancer needs, handle chemotherapy five days a month, handle chemotherapy monthly, take care of dogs, and try to be a parent.” Their son, Liam, recently celebrated his eighth birthday, “to a large extent with us.” “He is learning early lessons from it about what marriage means.”

Meanwhile, the guild is recovering “fearly” in hopes of building some independence, Morgan said. Glioblastoma tumors usually recur within six to nine months. He continued his MRI in two-month increments. Morgan is worried that her husband might lose some benefits, which depends to some extent on protocol Action, if she cannot return to her professorship full time, they may lose their home. They still have occasional scheduling problems. “We’re a really good test case because we keep using VA,” she told me. “What’s all about it with 2500 fires? There are seventy grand to go.”

When I contacted VA to comment on the status of the agency, its press secretary Kasperowicz accused “nearly all of the worst problems, such as the increase in health care waiting time, the backlog of veterans awaiting disability compensation, and the main issues of survivor welfare,” said Kasperowicz. In answering questions about how layoffs and restructuring might promote the guild experience, I received a statement attributed to local public affairs officials. “The premise of your inquiry is wrong.” When I asked why VA spent so long approving a request for extended guild treatment, I was told, “There has never been such a request to VA, and VA believes the request was sent to a non-VA office accidentally.” I checked; people who worked with many VA patients and were familiar with the guild’s extended treatment requirements confirmed that the daily fax had been sent to the Richmond VA system.

Samantha Crowder checked the issues in the dispatch department in one of the projects in Virginia, so I went through the guild experience. She said that in recent years, the arrangement department has been “super underfunded” and her research shows that turnover is high and morale is low. “Good schedulers are burnt down and cannot track productivity,” Claude told me. “Of course, the threat of being fired makes the situation worse.”

In the same conversation, she told me that the VA center in Florida must implement weekly town halls every week after employees express their suicidal thoughts. The congressional staff working with VA confirmed this to me. Veterans have 50% higher suicide rates than the average population, while one in four VA workers are veterans. Still, Veterans Crisis Line employees are one of the VA workers terminated by the Trump administration. (“A handful of VCL support staff were fired in February as part of the sack, but all were sent back to their posts within weeks,” Casperovic said.

The last person I talked to was a VA social worker on the West Coast. “I have a colleague who left their position this week,” he said. “A dedicated civil servant. A lot of knowledge and talent… It’s a gay man and feels these new policies are particularly directed.” The emails Collins sent to the entire agency were particularly disturbing. Based on the Anti-Christian Bias Task Force in the subject line, Collins directed all employees to report “policy, procedure, or informal understanding of Christian perspectives.” The social worker called the letter “a leader, an indicator of the power-filled viewpoint in the federal system.”

Social workers worry that VA will suffer long-term damage. He noted that employees tend to have personal connections with the military. “They chose to do this out of a sense of service,” he said. Recently, during job interviews, people have been asking him if he was hired and they will have to worry about losing their jobs. “The answer is I don’t know,” he told me. “From my point of view, there is a general feeling of having a popular feeling for the people we serve and the people we serve.” ♦