“The willingness with which our young people are likely to serve in any war, no matter how justified, shall be directly proportional to how they perceive veterans of earlier wars were treated and appreciated by our nation.” — George Washington Please take two minutes this Veterans Day to advocate for effective healthcare for our nation’s veterans. The Republican party just took over the Presidency, U.S. Senate, and U.S. House of Representatives. They are going to get their chance to make a mark on the Veterans Administration’s (VA) care for our nation’s veterans. It is a good bet that a large part of their platform for improvement will rely on private care outside of the VA.
NAMI Montana has advocated for effective care for Montana’s veterans both inside and outside of the VA for years and we believe that both types of care are critical. However, there is one dangerous pitfall to care outside of the VA that we need you to ask Congress to avoid.
The danger is that veterans’ care will be contracted out to an Accountable Care Organizations that will then offer private healthcare providers reimbursement rates and covered services that are worse than those of State Medicaid. The private healthcare providers will then refuse to accept those reimbursement rates and the veterans will either be left without care or scrambling to find another way to pay for their healthcare coverage.
This is the exact scenario that nearly played out in Montana during the Veterans Choice Act roll-out, before Senator Jon Tester intervened. This scenario is 100% preventable as long as Congress knows that it needs to be addressed when they are writing any VA reform bills.
Please contact Senator Steve Daines, Senator Jon Tester and Congressman Ryan Zinke and ask them “to make sure that private reimbursement rates for VA medical care are at least at the same cost and scope of services as State Medicaid reimbursement for the state that the veteran received care.”
Senator Steve Daines –
(202) 224- 2651- email contact (202) 224-2651Senator Jon Tester –
(202) 224-2644 – email contactCongressman Ryan Zinke – (202) 225-3211 – email contact
Not from Montana, but still want to advocate on this critical issue in the care for our nation’s veterans? You can find the contract information for your Congressional Representative here and your your Senators here. Thank you!
