TESTIMONY OF REPRESENTATIVE VIC SNYDER COMMITTEE ON VETERANS’ AFFAIRS SUBCOMMITTEE ON BENEFITS APRIL 13, 2000
Thank you Chairman Jack Quinn, Ranking Member Robert Filner and Members of the Subcommittee for the opportunity to appear here today to discuss the Department of Veterans’ Affairs adjudication of Hepatitis C (HCV) claims, the status of the VA’s initiative on HCV and my bill, H.R. 1020, the "Veterans’ Hepatitis C Benefits Act of 1999." Mr. Chairman, I commend you for taking an active role in the problems of veterans and HCV. My overriding goal is to ensure that veterans who contract the disease while serving their country get the treatment and compensation they need and deserve. Allow me to provide some background about the disease and the problems many veterans’ face, under current law, in their effort to obtain service connection. Hepatitis C is a relatively new disease; one that was not identified until 1989 and a reliable test discovered until 1992. If left untreated, HCV can lead to cirrhosis, liver cancer, liver failure and death. For many, it is a disease that requires a liver transplantation. Equally as problematic in treating the disease, is its long latency period. After contracting HCV, symptoms may not appear for as many as thirty years. This is a problem for veterans who have a current HCV diagnosis and apply for service-connection. Often the claim is denied as not well-grounded because of the veteran’s inability to provide evidence of the existence of a disease that the medical community did not know existed. Because of these factors, I decided to introduce H.R. 1020, the "Veterans Hepatitis C Benefits Act of 1999." H.R. 1020 would provide a presumption of service-connection for veterans with Hepatitis C who during service were exposed to one or more of the bill’s ten enumerated risk factors. Establishing presumptive service-connection relieves veterans—many already sick from the disease—from this burden of proof. In other words, if a veteran was exposed during service to something that is believed to cause HCV and the veteran is diagnosed with the disease after military service, my bill would presume that it is at least as likely as not that the illness is due to the in-service risk factor, and thus by law service-connected. Information surrounding the natural history of HCV is limited. However, we are learning more as investigators within the VA, other government agencies and private entities conduct research to help us better understand the disease and its effects on the veteran population. Since the introduction of my bill last spring, veterans from around the country have called, written and e-mailed my office to tell me of their difficulties. They have shared with me and my staff the problems they encountered in receiving medical treatment from the VA for their current HCV diagnosis, in obtaining service-connection in order that they might be compensated, or in getting their current rating reevaluated to account for their current disability status. Let me be clear. I am not here today to disparage the VA. To the contrary, the department deserves praise for developing and implementing its five-pronged program, which includes patient education, provider education, epidemiological assessment, treatment, and research. Additionally, the VA’s creation of two Hepatitis C Centers of excellencež one in Miami, the other in San Franciscož to develop national, coordinated patient and provider programs, among other activities, for use by the 172 VA medical centers across the country illustrates a firm commitment to understanding this disease and its effects on veterans. Given these activities, the VA is to be commended for leading, and in many ways advancing, the national discussion on HCV. Again, my goal is to ensure that veterans who risked their lives for our country and contracted this disease while doing so receive what they deserve. In my estimation, this bill, H.R. 1020, provides the VA another tool to achieve this goal as veterans’ claims can be processed more quickly, efficiently and accurately. Again, Mr. Chairman, thank you for holding this important hearing here today. I Iook forward to the testimony of our witnesses. I welcome comments and suggestions from you and our witnesses on this bill. Back to Witness List |