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VFW: Protect vets from health care penalty

While the head of the nation’s largest organization for combat veterans is pleased that Congress stepped in to assure Tricare beneficiaries that the new health care reform law will not penalize them for having military group health coverage, he says lawmakers need to do the same for veterans.

On Monday, Congress gave final approval to the Tricare Assurance Act, which officially exempts Tricare beneficiaries from a health care reform requirement to purchase private health care insurance or face a $750 annual penalty.

The exemption results from declaring that Tricare, as well as health care coverage provided to nonappropriated fund employees of the Defense Department, qualify as minimal essential coverage under the new law.

Thomas Tradewell Sr., national commander of Veterans of Foreign Wars, is urging lawmakers to also send the White House a Senate-passed bill, S 3162, that provides the same exemption for all veterans’ health care programs.

The bipartisan Senate bill provides specific protection for some dependents’ health coverage provided by the Veterans Affairs Department that is not explicitly mentioned as essential coverage in the health reform law, formally known as the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act.

Two key House Republicans — Steve Buyer of Indiana and Howard “Buck” McKeon of California — have been calling for months for legislation that specifically protects people using military and veterans health care from being directly or indirectly harmed by health reform, but such provisions were omitted from the final legislation that was signed into law.

Tradewell said there is still a chance to act if the House takes up the Senate-passed bill.

“There are a few more parts to this mission, which won’t be complete until the House passes S. 3162 and the president signs both bills,” he said.

“National health care will help many veterans who are ineligible for DoD or VA care, but missing from the original legislation was language that specifically recognized all military Tricare and VA programs as meeting minimum essential coverage standards,” said Tradewell, a combat-wounded Vietnam veteran from Sussex, Wis. “That meant stand-alone legislation was required to protect all the health care programs provided by the nation’s two largest federal departments.”

There has been some resistance in the House to passing the Senate bill out concern that this exemption could open the floodgate to other attempts to modify or repeal parts of health care reform.

Rep. Bob Filner, D-Calif., chairman of the House Veterans’ Affairs Committee, said he is not convinced that veterans-specific legislation is needed to clarify anything in the health reform law. If there is any confusion, Filner said he believes an executive order from Veterans Affairs Secretary Eric Shinseki or Health and Human Services Secretary Kathleen Sebelius would be enough to define VA-provided care as good enough to avoid the requirement to buy private health insurance or be penalized.