Congress boosts VA mental health care

The Dept. of Veterans' Affairs appropriation increases the emphasis on mental health care, but critics say its funding of medical research falls short.

By Amy Snow Landa, AMNews correspondent. Jan. 2/9, 2006.

Congress approved a Veterans' Affairs appropriations bill last year that is designed to ensure that money intended for veteran's mental health care is actually spent for that purpose.

The legislation, which President Bush signed Nov. 30, 2005, fences off $2.2 billion of the VA's appropriation for fiscal 2006 to be spent on specialty mental health care.

The earmark "is pretty unprecedented," said David Tucker, a Democratic staffer on the House Committee on Veterans' Affairs. Congress does not typically wall off spending for certain purposes within the VA's medical services budget, he said.

Overall, the law allocates $29.9 billion for VA medical care in fiscal 2006 -- an 8% increase over the $27.7 billion appropriated the previous year.

Congress also provided an additional $1.5 billion last summer to cover a shortfall in the VA's health care budget.

It's unclear whether the earmark actually will increase spending on VA mental health services. The current amount of VA spending on mental health care "is kind of hazy," Tucker said. "But I think there is an acknowledgment that VA has not put the money into mental health care that is needed."

Lawmakers say they want to make sure veterans have access to adequate mental health services, particularly as more soldiers return from Iraq and Afghanistan with posttraumatic stress disorder and other mental health conditions.

About 26% of veterans who returned from Iraq and Afghanistan and were treated at VA medical centers between October 2003 and February 2005 were diagnosed with mental health disorders, according to a study published in the March 31, 2005, New England Journal of Medicine.