The VA has denied up to 75 percent of disability claims related to burn pit exposure. That's because until the PACT Act, the agency left it up to veterans to prove that their condition resulted from their service.
compared respiratory symptoms in 1,816 veterans deployed to Iraq and Afghanistan to the symptoms of 5,335 people deployed elsewhere. Among those deployed in Iraq and Afghanistan, 14.5 percent needed spirometry, a test to examine lung function, compared to 3.3 percent in the other group. However, the group deployed to Iraq and Afghanistan also had a much higher percentage of smokers.
But insufficient evidence doesn’t mean no evidence, Miller says. When a team of physicians led by Miller conducted 49 lung biopsies on, all of those samples came back abnormal. Thirty-eight of them showed signs of constrictive bronchiolitis, a condition where the lungs’ smallest airways harden and stop functioning. The rare disease, which became a hallmark complication in veterans exposed to burn pits, is normally found in patients who have rheumatoid arthritis or have undergone a transplant.
It’s impossible to say whether an individual’s illness—Danovich’s leukemia, for instance—was triggered by any one cause. The PACT Act acknowledges that, Miller says. Its full name—the SFS Heath Robinson Honoring Our PACT Act to Support Veterans Exposed to Toxic Substances—honors one young “otherwise perfectly healthy” veteran who was diagnosed with a highly aggressive lung cancer following deployment, never having smoked.
Constrictive bronchiolitis doesn’t occur spontaneously. The disease’s frequency in veterans exposed to burn pits is “very strong” evidence for the long-term health effects of deployment.Even in Robinson’s case, whether his diagnosis was related to burn pits is uncertain. “This is where the PACT Act comes in. It says, ‘We’re not going to place this burden of proof on Heath Robinson or his family,’” Miller says. “You will never get enough data.
Danovich, alongside another member of his unit who was diagnosed with bladder cancer after deployment, is still fighting to have his medical care covered by the act. Neither he nor his colleague’s conditions are listed as presumptive. “The fight’s not over. It’s absolutely not over,” Danovich says. Still, the PACT Act’s passage is vindication—a sign that people are finally listening to him and other veterans.
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President Biden signs PACT Act into lawLaw makes it easier for veterans to get medical care after exposure to toxic fumes
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