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Lamoureux Valley Times -
August 16, 2009
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By Sue Lamoureux - LVT
Many Americans are concerned about the current swine flu pandemic as researchers work feverishly to develop and distribute a vaccine for the swine flu.
According to the World Health Organization, a pandemic is defined as an epidemic infectious disease that is spreading through human populations across a large region.
On May 20, 2009, MSNBC reported that there are 10,000 worldwide cases of swine flu.
An infectious disease is, of course, that which is contagious that makes you sick, which is generally recognized as being spread by bacteria, virus, fungus, etc. A non-infectious disease is a variety that can be due to exposure to the environment.
Modern medicine has developed medications to combat and or cure a large majority of infectious and non-infectious diseases.
There is no vaccine for Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder. There is no “cure” for PTSD.
(NOTE: The VA’s “cure” for PTSD is to prescribe as many medications listed in the Physician’s Desk Reference (PDR) as possible. If the right combination of medications is prescribed, the veteran will become suicidal or homicidal and that will alleve the VA of the burden and responsibility of caring for one less Veteran. )
According to Wikipedia, as of February 28, 2009, there were 1,454,515 active duty military personnel, plus the seven reserve component personnel of 848,000 for a grand total of 2,302,515 military personnel serving our country.
On March 23, 2009, Bradley G. Mayes, Director of Compensation and Pension Services, Veteran Benefits Administration, while speaking before the House Committee on Veterans Affairs, stated that from 1999 to fiscal year ending 2008, that service connected compensation claims for PTSD rose from 120,000 to 345,520.
On June 18, 2009, the Army Times reported that the backlog of pending VA claims was 722,000, with an additional 172,000 claims in appeals – which indicates that the VA has a backlog of almost 1 million claims that have not been adjudicated.
The figures from the two previous sources of course, do not include the number of Veterans who have not filed, or will not file a claim with the Veterans Administration.
Out of that one million pending claims, the possibility exists that 100% of them could involve PTSD, among other service connected disabilities.
In 2007, according to the Journal of the American Medical Association (JAMA) 16.7% of active duty military were affected by PTSD; 24.5% of the reserve component were affected.
Therefore, using statistics from over 2 years ago if we take 16.7% of our current active duty military and 24.5% of our reserve component, we could have another 450,664 soldiers diagnosed with PTSD.
Let’s not forget those almost 1 million pending claims. If we take the average of 16.7% and 24.5% and apply 20.6% to those almost 1 million pending claims, that is an additional 206,000 cases of PTSD.
That means we have the potential of an additional 656,664 PTSD service connected disability compensated Veterans in addition to the 345,520 establish claims, for a total of 1,002,184. And guess what? It’s coming to America .
I’m sorry, but that sounds like a pandemic to me.
Our government, the DoD, the VA and the spoiled, ungrateful, apathetic, American public is not ready for this pandemic.
Wake up America - PTSD is on your doorstep.
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