In the News

WASHINGTON NEWS IN BRIEF:

By Frank Lockwood 

Hill calls out VA over its retesting

U.S. Rep. French Hill has given his latest Golden Fleece Award to the U.S. Department of Veterans Affairs, accusing the agency of wasting millions of dollars of taxpayer dollars.

The Republican from Little Rock cited a recent review by the department's office of inspector general. It found that the agency had required thousands of disabled veterans to submit to unwarranted medical re-examinations.

Between March 2017 and August 2017, 19,800 unnecessary examinations were performed at a cost of $10.1 million, the report said.

The tests imposed an "undue hardship" on veterans and squandered department resources, the review found.

According to the report, re-examinations can be required "whenever VA determines there is a need to verify either the continued existence or the current severity of a disability."

But re-examinations are not appropriate, in most instances, for patients who are older than 55 years old; nor are they necessary for people who have permanent disabilities that are unlikely to improve. Other categories are also exempt.

With proper screening, many of the re-examinations could have been avoided, the report said.

In a letter to the new secretary of veterans affairs, Robert Wilkie, Hill denounced what he called "careless, wasteful spending" and urged the department to do better.

The late U.S. Sen. William Proxmire, D-Wis., was the creator of the Golden Fleece Award, using it to highlight government spending that he considered wasteful. After Hill's election to Congress in 2014, he resurrected the award.