seamanstaines

EDITORIAL: VA corruption a national disgrace | Las Vegas Review-Journal

Interesting how Americans cook the most important books, those of their finest.
Why should I believe any of your stats?

The Department of Veterans Affairs finally is under intense scrutiny for its bogus waiting lists and the unconscionable treatment delays that have caused an untold number of preventable patient deaths. But new information shows that malfeasance, malpractice and outright corruption within the VA is worse than Americans could have imagined — much worse.

According to a letter sent Monday to President Barack Obama by the Office of Special Counsel, the VA knowingly and repeatedly ignored warnings from whistleblowers about a “troubling pattern” of negligent practices that put patients at risk. “The VA, and particularly the VA’s Office of the Medical Inspector, has consistently used a ‘harmless error’ defense, where the department acknowledges problems but claims patient care is unaffected,” the letter says. “This approach has prevented the VA from acknowledging the severity of systemic problems and from taking the necessary steps to provide quality care to veterans.” In other words, the VA is an unresponsive, unaccountable, excuse-making mess that not only tolerates poor performance, but encourages it.

Additionally, whistleblower Pauline DeWenter told CNN this week that records of dead veterans were being changed at the Phoenix VA hospital — even now, after the VA waiting list and patient death scandal was first exposed — to hide how many veterans died while waiting for care.

Ms. DeWenter, a scheduling clerk at the Phoenix VA, said that beginning last year she was given the job of managing a secret waiting list of veterans waiting for medical care, a list created to hide actual VA wait times and falsely report timely treatment. Many veterans were left on the list for nine months or longer without ever receiving care. The hospital lacked enough doctors to handle new patients, let alone the backlog of existing patients, many of whom were extremely ill. As the secret waiting list grew, Ms. DeWenter said she was forced to make life-and-death decisions regarding which patients would get care and which ones wouldn’t.

On more than one occasion, when Ms. DeWenter would call to let a veteran know that an appointment had become available, she would learn that the patient had died while waiting. Each time, Ms. DeWenter would update the list to reflect the death, but at least seven times since October — including in recent weeks — someone else at the VA went in behind Ms. DeWenter and altered the list to show the deceased veterans as alive.

goober

We don't live longer...people who pay substantially less live longer.

And it's not "a little more money", it's $5000/person * 318,000,000 people, that's 1.5 trillion dollars a year, and growing, enough to pay off the national debt in 10 years.

Jimmyb

It seems that I have a slight advantage over you as not only can this “twerp1” read, but I can also think, which seems to put you at a severe disadvantage. And your dependency on copy and paste jobs you cannot understand or vet along with your mysterious knowledge of only all things left and right in the U.S, and American idiomatic words and phrases and colloquial language usage.

The reason I posted what I did was because I can read and think. Your copy and paste is from the CDC, and the CDC gets its information from the OECD, which is about as biased as an entity can be. When all deaths from fatal injuries, smoking related deaths, and obesity related deaths are removed, the US jumps to the top because of the quality of healthcare. Another misrepresentation by the OECD is comparing the outcomes of socialized medicine to the US as a whole. Fortunately for the individual who can think, the US has four distinct forms of insurance: Medicaid, Medicaid, the VA, and private insurance. Outcomes are universally lower with government or socialized insurance than private insurance.

Jimmyb

Again with a copy and paste from the CDC based on the OECD and the United Nations Children’s Fund, both have been brutally skewered for using misleading numbers.

The flaws in your copy and paste you cannot overcome:

The registration of babies born too early, too light, and too short in the other countries.

The selective registration of pre-term infants who survived in other countries.

The systematic under-registration of those who did not survive in other countries.

The data from the cultures that do not attempt to save prematurely born infants with birth defects. The US always does its best to save any baby born regardless of its condition, and those that do not survive are added to the misleading statistic used by the OECD.

The statistics when infants born before 24 weeks are subtracted from the CDC report, which decreased the infant mortality rate by 30%. This accurate data puts the US equal with any other developed country.

The comparison that an infant weighing less than 500 grams in some other countries is not considered a live birth, and is considered a live birth in the US. Eighty percent of these births in other countries do not survive and are not counted, but are counted in the US.

The countries that classify a baby as stillborn or a miscarriage if it survives less than 24 hours regardless if it is breathing and has a beating heart, the US classifies these infants as live born. Forty percent of all infant deaths happen within twenty-four hours.

The countries that classify babies less than thirty centimeters long as either stillborn or a miscarriage.

In the past fifteen years, there have been 52 babies born who survived weighing less than 400 grams at birth, and 4 forty-two of these babies were born in the US.

Jimmyb

We live longer when all data is equal.

RNG

That implies that the US is incompetent when it comes to treating injuries, smoking related issues and obesity. Can the other systems being evaluated remove whole chunks of items also?

It costs the most in the world, but this does give the US the lead in lifespans of people who lead an ideal life, don't get sick or in an accident. Wow.

Jimmyb

I am pretty sure they never get to it because it is not true.

The difference between that $3400 and $8500, and I am sure you fabricated those numbers as well, but I will use them, is the survivability rate being much higher in the US.

Jimmyb

No it doesn't. The US is the best at treating injuries and smoking and obesity related issues.

Your last sentence is nonsensical.

goober

Grasping at straws now fan boy.......
You don't mind paying twice as much for less.....I actually believe that...

RNG

No, your conclusion is nonsensical when compared to your objection to those factors being included when US outcomes are compared.