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 Vallarta Living | Veteran Affairs | May 2007 
Memorial Day - Did You Remember?
 David Lord - PVNN
Did you remember to give a moment of silence and show respect for the Veterans who have died on this Memorial Day? Understanding they sacrificed their lives on the principles instilled in them by living in America?
In this war, often their death was not an act of heroism facing a fixed position, it was the result of simply doing their duty as a soldier, airman, marine or sailor and being in the wrong place at the wrong time.
They have been called to risk their lives time and time again, they are the part time citizen soldiers, closer to civilians than career military, doing only two weeks of training a year in the National Guard.
The Revolutionary War of Independence was fought by citizen soldiers too, forever remembered as Patriots. Imagine them seeing this war today, imagine what a Patriot would do in this situation.
They fought on home ground for their nearby families, and volunteered for the few years of the Revolutionary War, often returning to family and farm during the war period, then returning to duty with General Washington as needed.
Cast that against our volunteer soldiers today, who fight as foreigners in an Arab nation thousands of miles away, in a nation that views them as an occupying force at best. Then enduring thirteen to eighteen months of duty not once but two, three, four, five times - and each time it is more dangerous than before.
Your family and friends sympathize and try to hold on but move apart bit by bit because you are far away. You are changed by the continuous separation and stress of war, your not the same as you were, now rough and crude, just a shadow of your former self that's turned edgy, annoyed and isolated, rather than connected to love ones.
The cruelty of it is beyond understanding, what you and I allow to happen to our sons and daughters in the name of America we would not do to a stray dog on the street. Your detachment from this War was planned out, there was no draft because if everyone had to serve in our military in Iraq there would have been mass riot in our streets.
Be guided by this thought: at no other time in our history has your good name as an American Citizen been dragged through the muddy murkiness of an undefined War that requires unprecedented sacrifice by volunteers.
VETERANS INSURANCE
Since 1999, the U.S. government has had a law on the books that requires private insurance companies to reimburse medical expenses given for any non-service connected medical care that is provided at a VA Hospital.
If a Veteran that uses the VA hospital for medical care or treatment also has private insurance coverage he-she is required to inform the VA at check in. It was not until recently that the private carriers began to receive billing from the VA for all service provided that was not a service connected disability.
The Insurance providers were totally unprepared to face the economic demand coming from the VA. The dollars paid out in March of this year from just one New York based insurance company amounted to three million three hundred thousand dollars - and that was just to one VA hospital in New York City for one month.
The Executive of the company told me it is more than just lost profit that concerns her, it will become a major factor in the future of premiums for all people seeking private insurance coverage.
As Veterans know, when we do use the VA hospital we expect the service is covered by our co-payment which is based on one of eight categories we are assigned to. These categories then determine if we are eligible for care and treatment by them paying the deductible, usually around fifteen dollars per prescription given.
To my knowledge, the actual doctor's visit itself has never billed to outside carriers - until now. By charging these private insurance companies for your doctor's visits, the VA is acting as a private provider using a private doctor for billing purposes, not as the government paid doctors they are.
This blending and mixing up of VA medical care gives the billed insurance company the right to treat it as it would any private H.M.O. This new tactic, given by Congress to the VA, has now turned your VA into a money making enterprise.
Since the VA is a huge provider of social medicine to U.S. Veterans and their entitled dependents, I am concerned that private carriers will have to charge higher premiums for Veterans to offset the charges being paid to VA for your free medical care.
In addition to the higher premiums another concern is close at hand. How do Veterans protect themselves from receiving a billing from the private insurance company for referrals to a VA specialist such as heart, radiology, internal medicine, just to mention a few?
The fact is that in the private sector, the general practice Doctor makes a referral to the specialist, which is then approved by the insurance company before you see that specialist. But because VA Hospitals are not an approved provider of the insurance company, according to the vice president, you have receive unauthorized care by an unauthorized provider, so the insurance company can bill the Veteran whatever the VA billed them. I will be revisiting this problem in future articles.
 David Lord served in Vietnam as combat Marine for 1st Battalion 26th Marines, during which time he was severely wounded. He received the Purple Heart and the Presidential Unit Citation for his actions during the war in Vietnam. In Mexico, David now represents all veterans south of the U.S. border all the way to Panama, before the V.A. and the Board of Veterans Appeals. David Lord provides service to veterans at no fee. Veterans are welcome to drop in and discuss claims/benefits to which they are entitled by law at his office located at Bayside Properties, 160 Francisca Rodriguez, tel.: 223-4424, call him at home 299-5367, on his cell: 044 (322) 205-1323, or email him at david.lord@yahoo.com.
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