Used up and thrown away
1.8 million veterans get no health care
By
Caleb T. Maupin
Published Jun 29, 2007 10:47 PM
Rosa Luxemburg, the Polish-born revolutionary and courageous opponent of
imperialist war, wrote of soldiers returning to Germany after World War I that
they had “sacrificed the most blood and goods” but that they
“return to need and misery, while billions has been heaped in the hands
of a few.”
She would say the same thing today about U.S. soldiers.
The young men and women who, often out of basic economic need, sign up for the
military are betrayed. Recruiters patrol the poor and oppressed neighborhoods
bearing promises of veterans’ benefits. Capitalist politicians brag about
how much they “support the troops.”
But regardless of their rhetoric, regardless of recruiters’ empty
promises, there are currently in the U.S. 1.8 million veterans who have no
health insurance or any access to medical care, according to the Washington
Post of June 21.
It seems that, even if young people donate their bodies to the rulers of this
country, they still can’t get what is guaranteed to everyone in socialist
countries and even in some capitalist ones: healthcare provided to the people
free of charge.
It was already a scandal that 45 million people in the U.S. are without any
health coverage. Now, at this time when every big shot professes to love the
troops who are fighting the rich man’s war, it is doubly scandalous that
even veterans can’t get health services.
The Post article added: “The ranks of uninsured veterans have increased
by 290,000 since 2000, said Stephanie J. Woolhandler, the Harvard Medical
School professor who presented her findings yesterday before the House
Committee on Veterans Affairs. About 12.7 percent of non-elderly
veterans—or one in eight—lacked health coverage in 2004, the most
recent year for which figures are available, she said, up from 9.9 percent in
2000.”
Some of these veterans are eligible for Veterans Administration care, but there
are no VA hospitals or facilities near them. The government has closed many
down recently—just as veterans with multiple problems have been returning
home.
Another recent study, conducted by Dr. Drew A. Helmer for the Baylor College of
Medicine, discovered that, in a group of 56 veterans returned from Iraq and
Afghanistan, the average was four physical health concerns for each one, and
that 55 percent also had mental health issues. The study was published in the
Journal of Occupational and Environmental Medicine.
Perhaps this callous disregard for veterans should not be surprising. Under
capitalism, workers are laid off when their work is no longer profitable;
public housing is reduced as homelessness rises; cuts are made to food stamp
services; schools are crumbling and classrooms are packed even as the incomes
of the super-rich soar into the stratosphere.
In a system based on profit, when people are no longer useful tools for those
who crowd the halls of power, they will be cast aside as useless, no matter how
many promises must be broken. The only recourse for veterans is to organize and
use their skills to fight back.
Articles copyright 1995-2012 Workers World.
Verbatim copying and distribution of this entire article is permitted in any medium without royalty provided this notice is preserved.
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