Kent Conrad: “I held a hearing in my State on this question. I invited all the veterans organizations. It was disappointing to hear…”

“I held a hearing in my State on this question. I invited all the veterans organizations. It was disappointing to hear what is happening to veterans across the country. We had testimony of people waiting 10 months to get an appointment for specialty care, an appointment to see an orthopaedic surgeon, an appointment to have certain eye care because there is a shortage of specialists in the VA. They testified clearly and compellingly that more money is needed. We will hear from the other side, we will hear from the chairman of the committee, that there have been significant increases of veterans medical care. There is a chart that shows that is exactly true, going back 10 or 12 years. We would expect just on inflation alone, over that extended period, we would see a doubling of the costs. Remember, when we come to veterans medical care, that upward slope is even sharper because health care expenditures have been advancing faster than the rate of inflation.”