Vietnam Veterans should submit their applications now in order receive benefits from the date of application
Vetspac has formed a team to automate and speed up application for VA benefits and hopes to assist the VA in processing about 185,000 new Agent Orange related applications.
The US government cost of this new benefit is about $4 billion in mandatory spending each year, and details of the new rules are published.
The total increase in Agent Orange benefits costs for FY 2010 include $12.3 billion for retroactive benefit payments. The ten-year total costs for ischemic heart disease is $31.9 billion, Parkinson’s disease, $3.5 billion, and hairy cell and B cell leukemia, $3.4 billion.
Most new VA applicants will be related to Ischemic Heart Disease (IHD)
New Vietnam Veteran applicants are expected to be rated have about a 60% degree average disability for IHD. Overall, unless Unemployability rules are changed this will most likely convert to a 100% VA disability, or about $3000.00 monthly.
The Services will have to gear up for additional Combat Related Special Compensation (CRSC) applications while DFAS processes complex retroactive payments to retirees and widows. However coordination between the Pentagon who developed service guidance to DFAS has not started.
Expect the Veterans Benefit Association to expand it's outreach and support staff to coordinate the implementation of this significant ruling. The Pentagon, Defense Finance and Accounting (DFAS) and the Services are all impacted with this new ruling.
Many Vietnam Veterans with retiree status will also be eligible for tax exempt Combat Related Special Compensation of up to $3000 monthly, in the case of 100% agent Orange disability including retroactive back pay.
Coordination with The Pentagon is often a problem, so expect year long delay in retiree CRSC payments. Thousands stationed in Vietnam could be eligible.
The VA estimates 185,000 more Vietnam Vets will qualify for $50B more in benefits. Heart disease alone will amount to a 14B increase in benefits. The cost estimates were divulged by an OMB official.
Both Vietnam Veterans and their spouses will be eligible for awards, including retroactive DIC payments and back pay in accordance with the recent Nehmer court decision.
About 86,000 claims previously denied by the VA before 1985 will be revisited, and $14B is expected to be paid related to heart disease.
Widows or widowers with claims denied in the past whose spouse’s death was contributed to (or caused by) what is now a presumptive Agent Orange illness can re-open their DIC claims requesting that either they be awarded DIC—if denied in the past—and be awarded retro DIC back to the date of the veteran’s death.
Many older rating decisions precluding many agent orange related claims may now receive retroactive awards back to the date the disability was first approved by the VA.
Many payments will have to be processed by DFAS and most are eligible for CRSC awards.
We expect the VA to announce a new policy soon. The rules are crafted to avoid compensation backlogs and increased benefit exams. For example, a personal family physician's letter will be allowed for the three newly approved agent orange conditions.
Previously approved conditions for which Vietnam War veterans receive compensation, including prostate cancer, respiratory cancers, soft-tissue sarcomas, Hodgkin's disease, non-Hodgkin's lymphoma and multiple myeloma.
Veterans who served in Vietnam between 1962 and 1975 will qualify for monthly disability compensation and do not have to provide proof they were exposed to Agent Orange.
Vetspac is positioned to assist its members and new members in applying for this under simplified rules, soon to be officially announced by the VA.
In order to assist with claims backlog and new exams the VA will accept letters from family physicians supporting claims for Agent Orange related conditions. Thousands of widows whose husbands died of Agent Orange disabilities will benefit to retroactive benefits and back pay, as well as DIC payments.