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Faster OK sought for Agent Orange claims

The chairman of the House Veterans’ Affairs Committee has a radical idea to cut the huge and seemingly intractable backlog of veterans’ benefits claims.

To focus on handling new claims from Iraq and Afghanistan war veterans, Rep. Bob Filner, D-Calif., says the Department of Veterans Affairs should approve — with minimal questioning — claims filed by Vietnam veterans, especially those whose claims deal with exposure to the toxic herbicide Agent Orange.

In an interview Thursday, Filner said he sees no way for VA to make headway in reducing the backlog of more than 400,000 claims without “radical” reforms that must include eliminating an adversarial process that puts veterans in a defensive position.

“We know Agent Orange is a carcinogen, and that people could be exposed directly or indirectly in Vietnam,” he said. “We don’t need to be demanding scientific proof any longer.”

Expanded compensation would include paying the disputed claims of Navy veterans who served in the waters off Vietnam and never came ashore but think they still have herbicide-related health problems.

Filner’s idea would require an act of Congress. He envisions linking it with other disability legislation.

Filner, a longtime advocate of improved Agent Orange benefits, has another motive in pushing for VA approval of Vietnam-era claims. He thinks it will be easier to pass disability benefits reforms aimed at helping Iraq and Afghanistan veterans — including a controversial plan that would consider income loss, quality of life and a veterans’ continued participation in rehabilitation when setting monthly benefits payments — if older veterans think the government is also doing something to help them.

“We have to do something for both groups,” Filner said.

To cut the backlog, Filner thinks VA needs a system that quickly approves relatively simple claims and provides partial benefits — maybe 30 percent or 40 percent of full payment — for veterans while they are waiting for their claims to be verified and approved.

VA and some veterans groups oppose such a system out of concern that automatically approving claims with no prior verification could encourage fraud.