President Joe Biden lays a wreath at the Tomb of the Unknown Soldier at the National Veterans Day Observance at Arlington National Cemetery in Arlington, Va., Monday, Nov. 11, 2024. (AP Photo/Manuel Balce Ceneta) The Department of Veterans Affairs has started the process to designate multiple myeloma and acute and chronic leukemias as linked to military service in the Persian Gulf, Afghanistan and elsewhere, a change that will give affected veterans quicker access to disability compensation.
During his last Veterans Day address as commander in chief, President Joe Biden announced the update to the list of diseases presumed to be related to exposure to burn pits and other airborne pollutants according to the PACT Act .
The change follows an announcement last week by VA Secretary Denis McDonough that bladder cancer and ureter cancers will be designated as presumptive illnesses , and veterans who served at Karshi-Khanabad Air Base in Uzbekistan in the early 2000s also would qualify for expedited claims.
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"Too many of our nation’s veterans have served only to return home to suffer from permanent effects of poisonous chemicals," Biden said during his address Monday at Arlington National Cemetery.
The PACT Act update, which must go through the federal rulemaking process before it is finalized, followed a 15-month study by the VA into whether veterans who served in designated areas had higher rates of those cancers.
The VA launched its own internal process in 2021 to determine whether health conditions may be considered related to military service and, since then, has concluded that asthma, rhinitis, sinusitis, nine rare lung cancers and now bladder cancer, ureter cancer, acute leukemia, chronic leukemia and multiple myeloma fall into that category for personnel who served during specific time frames and locales.
Those who are covered include post-9/11 veterans who served in Afghanistan, Djibouti, Egypt, Jordan, Lebanon, Syria, Uzbekistan and Yemen, and those assigned to the Persian Gulf region, including Somalia, on or after Aug. 2, 1990.
The VA also announced Monday that it intends to make health care less expensive for veterans enrolled […]
VA Set to Add Leukemia, Multiple Myeloma to List of Conditions Linked to Burn Pits
