thedrifter
04-23-07, 07:03 PM
Retired gen.: Disability for any vet with ALS
By Bryant Jordan - Staff writer
Posted : Monday Apr 23, 2007 17:58:43 EDT
As a national support group gears up for ALS Awareness Month in May, a retired Air Force general is asking the Veterans Administration to give a service-connected disability to any veteran diagnosed with amyotrophic lateral sclerosis.
Since 2001, the VA has automatically granted a disability to all veterans of the Persian Gulf War because studies found that those who served there have a 2 percent higher incident rate of ALS — commonly known as Lou Gehrig’s Disease — than the general population. But Retired Brig. Gen. Thomas R. Mikolajcik of Mount Pleasant, S.C., a Gulf War vet diagnosed with the illness in October 2003, said all veterans have a 1.6 percent higher incident rate than the general population.
“How do you differentiate between a 1.6 and 2.0 incident rate?” Mikolajcik told Air Force Times on April 23. “All veterans with ALS should get a service-connected disability and get help before they die.”
Jim Benson, a spokesman for the Veterans Administration, said the VA is looking at an ALS study compiled by the National Academies’ Institute of Medicine, and two House committees are reviewing the information, as well.
“It’s an issue being discussed and looked at here at the VA,” Benson said, “but there’s no decision at this point regarding any extension of those benefits yet” to veterans who did not serve in the Persian Gulf.
According to the ALS Association, a national group based in California, people with the disease typically die between two and five years after they’re diagnosed.
The association has designated May as ALS Awareness Month.
In a March 23 letter to the VA, Mikolajcik cited a finding by the National Academies Institute of Medicine that says “military service in general — not confined to exposures specific to the Gulf War — is related to the development of ALS.”
Mikolajcik said that if the institute’s conclusion is accurate, then the VA is granting benefits to only a portion of all service members exposed to whatever triggers ALS.
Mikolajcik, who has lost the use of his arms and legs, was in Washington, D.C., last year to push for more funding and research into ALS.
Though congressmen said there would be hearings on it, nothing has been scheduled, Mikolajcik said. “Things move slowly unless you’re right there [in Washington],” he said.
But some things move quickly.
Since the VA began a national registry of veterans with ALS, 1,877 have registered, he said; of that number, “only 954 of us are still alive. That tells you the rapidity of the disease and the relentlessness of it,” he said.
Mikolajcik commanded the 437th Airlift Wing at Charleston Air Force Base, S.C., before he retired in 1996. During the Gulf War, as commander of the 435th Tactical Airlift Wing at Rhein-Main Air Base, Germany, he made trips into the theater to visit airmen deployed there.
Ellie
By Bryant Jordan - Staff writer
Posted : Monday Apr 23, 2007 17:58:43 EDT
As a national support group gears up for ALS Awareness Month in May, a retired Air Force general is asking the Veterans Administration to give a service-connected disability to any veteran diagnosed with amyotrophic lateral sclerosis.
Since 2001, the VA has automatically granted a disability to all veterans of the Persian Gulf War because studies found that those who served there have a 2 percent higher incident rate of ALS — commonly known as Lou Gehrig’s Disease — than the general population. But Retired Brig. Gen. Thomas R. Mikolajcik of Mount Pleasant, S.C., a Gulf War vet diagnosed with the illness in October 2003, said all veterans have a 1.6 percent higher incident rate than the general population.
“How do you differentiate between a 1.6 and 2.0 incident rate?” Mikolajcik told Air Force Times on April 23. “All veterans with ALS should get a service-connected disability and get help before they die.”
Jim Benson, a spokesman for the Veterans Administration, said the VA is looking at an ALS study compiled by the National Academies’ Institute of Medicine, and two House committees are reviewing the information, as well.
“It’s an issue being discussed and looked at here at the VA,” Benson said, “but there’s no decision at this point regarding any extension of those benefits yet” to veterans who did not serve in the Persian Gulf.
According to the ALS Association, a national group based in California, people with the disease typically die between two and five years after they’re diagnosed.
The association has designated May as ALS Awareness Month.
In a March 23 letter to the VA, Mikolajcik cited a finding by the National Academies Institute of Medicine that says “military service in general — not confined to exposures specific to the Gulf War — is related to the development of ALS.”
Mikolajcik said that if the institute’s conclusion is accurate, then the VA is granting benefits to only a portion of all service members exposed to whatever triggers ALS.
Mikolajcik, who has lost the use of his arms and legs, was in Washington, D.C., last year to push for more funding and research into ALS.
Though congressmen said there would be hearings on it, nothing has been scheduled, Mikolajcik said. “Things move slowly unless you’re right there [in Washington],” he said.
But some things move quickly.
Since the VA began a national registry of veterans with ALS, 1,877 have registered, he said; of that number, “only 954 of us are still alive. That tells you the rapidity of the disease and the relentlessness of it,” he said.
Mikolajcik commanded the 437th Airlift Wing at Charleston Air Force Base, S.C., before he retired in 1996. During the Gulf War, as commander of the 435th Tactical Airlift Wing at Rhein-Main Air Base, Germany, he made trips into the theater to visit airmen deployed there.
Ellie