SHOCK – 50,000 Veterans Unknowingly Carry Hepatitis C
Newsweek just exposed Department of Veterans Affairs Hepatitis C problem acknowledging that 50,000 veterans unknowingly carry the virus. The article mentions this scary news as though it were a mere side note, which I found strange enough to focus on here.
Records indicate 3.5 million Americans are infected, 234,000 of which are veterans. At this time, 174,000 veterans have been diagnosed with Hepatitis C while 50,000 veterans carry the disease without knowing. The cost to treat these veterans will be staggering.
Traditionally, treatment of Hepatitis C required a liver transplant. Now, some veterans have been approved by VA to take a new wonder drugs called Sovaldi, Olysio and Telaprevir. These drugs are called protease inhibitors. They block replication of the virus. Taking these drugs has increased cure rates in excess of 85 percent.
Cost of the new treatment types are outrageously high. Traditional drugs cost between $15k to $20k for a 48-week treatment. A 12-week treatment course using Sovaldi can cost more than $50k per veteran. Given the high number of veterans with the disease, estimates for the cost of treatment are more than $12 billion per year.
Some veterans fear the extreme cost of the drugs will result in rationing:
For example, the Louisville VA strictly limited his use of telaprevir and boceprevir, two antivirals that came out in 2011. Meanwhile, he was free to prescribe as much interferon and ribavirin as he liked. The former were much more effective—and expensive—than the latter. The VA would also “redirect” his patients to doctors who weren’t so gung-ho about prescribing the costlier medication, Cecil says, and would tell veterans “they did not need treatment. People were given vitamins and zinc instead of interferon.” (Bob laughed when he heard this—he still routinely gets free zinc in the mail from the VA. He throws it out.)
Speaking on behalf of her ailing husband, Dorothy Dames says VA physicians knew Martin Dames had life-threatening cirrhosis as early as 2002, but didn’t tell them for more than eight years. As with Bob, the late notification led to horrendous consequences for Dames’s health. He was eventually treated with interferon-based therapy and ribavirin, but by 2010 his cirrhosis had advanced to liver cancer and he was in desperate need of a transplant. A VA doctor declined to put him on a waiting list, saying the poor health of his lungs disqualified him.
“They don’t treat you, and then they wait for you to get very sick, and then they say you’re too sick for a liver transplant,” Martin Dames says. He’d be dead today but for the efforts of his wife, who mobilized the support of others in their “very patriotic town” in Missouri and enlisted help from their congresswoman, Jo Ann Emerson, whose staff made several phone calls to the VA. Three months later, Dames finally got his liver transplant, but his ordeal was far from over.
What do you think? Will VA pay the piper on Hepatitis C or will veterans be forced to endure the extreme hardship of the virus?
Source: https://www.newsweek.com/vas-hepatitis-c-problem-330277
I joined the USAF in 1979, and right after tech school, I was sent to the PI for 2 years. While I was there, I had numerous OBYGN operations, and was pretty sick off and on for 18 months. In 2013, I was extremely fatigued, hair falling out, skin itchy all the time, and a lot of other things.
During a random lab test for employment, I was dx with HEP C, further testing to include a fiber scan determined I had stage IV liver disease and they stated, I had HEC for over 30 years.
I was lucky that my company paid for two treatments, and I was declared SVR in Feb 2015.
However my liver is n sad shape, and my medical file since 2013 4 inches thick. I’m wondering if I make a claim if they VA will give me disability and how much. I am working but still have major health issue, and Dr feels I will need a transplant down the road. I am currently 58 years old, and I retired after 26 combined ADAF and USAFR years of service.
To Charles; We are going to D.C. in October to present evidence on jetguns and would love to have your testimony. Please contact me at HCVets.com on Facebook
Ben,
You know what I find strange? The part of the article where Dr Ross said, “Since the beginning of 2013 more than 14,000 patients have been treated with the new class of antivirals”.
Sovaldi wasn’t approved by the FDA until December 2013 and Harvoni wasn’t approved until October 2014. So how could the VA start treating patients at the beginning of 2013 if the meds weren’t even approved yet?
So he either lied about when they started treating with the new meds or they treated people as part of clinical trials, which would mean they’re lying about how much money they’ve spent treating veterans with the new meds because when you participate in clinical trials the meds are provided free and the doctors are paid for participating.
So I went one step further and checked Gilead’s studies and sure enough, several of the studies list VA clinics as participants. Which is also very strange because I’ve never heard any of the veterans say they were treated as part of a clinical trial.
S.
P.S. I have enough evidence to prove jetgun transmission of hep c including the 1970 military nursing guidelines on the use of jetguns that prove they violated every single guideline, hundreds of pictures that prove it and a jetgun with the manual. I think you should hire me.
Sounds like you have enough information to help lots of veterans. I being one of them. I have not put in a claim yet because I was hoping for a class action or help from a organization group or maybe you. I would for sure like to hear more of what information you have.
I do not believe that I will get the miracle pill as I was told that you pretty much have to be on your death bed. That is as per conversation that I had with the infectious disease specialist Jyoti Sahni, MD in Saginaw, MI.
Larry,
What’s mine is yours but I’ve collected so much it would take me days to tell you all of it. There are papers showing that the vaccines you got were not FDA approved for jetgun use. The jetguns caused fluid to splash back on the skin contaminating the gun, made the site bleed more, missed the intended space, dosing was unreliable, only the head of the gun was sterilized in machines that were later recalled , the guns were not wiped between recruits, were used by untrained individuals, they malfunctioned, lacked upkeep, leaked metal and were stored in the same container as the foot pedal so they were certainly not sterile.The manual proves that.
On the other hand, the nursing guidelines say:
1. Your arm must be supported while they give the vaccine.
2. The jetgun has to be placed against your skin at a 90 degree angle, kept there for 3 seconds after pulling the trigger.
3. The area must be wiped with a dry cotton or gauze.
Click on my profile to see pictures of guideline violations.
Plus, here’s a few of my favorites:
This quote comes from the 2005 FDA Safety of Jetguns Advisory Meeting
“DR. FRIEDE: The devices that we have seen without a protection cap, we have data from the calves and the data from the Hoffman study in Brazil to show that frequent contamination of the ejected did take place. And that contamination was clearly of a level of blood that we are convinced can carry disease. So the devices which do not have a protection cap which are to be used for giving intramuscular injection we are convinced that these carry a significant risk.”
And…
“And you can see after injection into the test fixture, there is contamination at the injection site. There’s a combination of splash back as well as contact contamination during the injection process. You see that it’s contaminated with the fluorescein dye”.
Here’s some of my favorite studies that showed jet injectors got contaminated with enough blood to transmit hepatitis….
“A model to assess the infection potential of jet injectors used in mass immunisation”
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/11427278
“Potential for cross-contamination from use of a needleless injector.”
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/9721400
“Preventing contamination between injections with multiple-use nozzle needle-free injectors: a safety trial.”
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/18272265
This last quote comes from a book called “Vaccines” written by the top world experts on vaccines…
“However, after injections with saline of volunteers in China who carried hepatitis B virus, 8% of subsequent ejectates into vials—representing the next vaccinees in a clinic or mass campaign—were found by polymerase chain reaction assay to contain hepatitis B antigen. High-speed microcinematography also revealed extensive splashback from the skin during injection with MUNJIs.
This body of evidence supports the conclusion that the design of MUNJIs is inherently UNSAFE, and any reuse of fluid pathways or unsterile components that are in direct or indirect contact with consecutive patients should be abandoned. Even if contamination could be shown to be extremely rare, it is unlikely that policymakers could be convinced to set any level of acceptable risk”.
https://www.inkling.com/read/vaccines-plotkin-orenstein-offit-6th/chapter-61/jet-injection
I wish there was more I could do,
S.
Larry, most of the info is at https://hcvets.com/data/occupational/munji/toc.htm Hope it helps…
Larry, I forgot one more important quote from the 2005 FDA Safety of Jetguns Advisory Meeting. You’ll like this one….
“So this is a slide showing the comparison of first generation MUNJI testing with this method versus a protector cap injector. These are the number of samples. So for a 100 samples with the first generation MUNJI device, all were contaminated, a 100 percent with an average contamination rate of 268 picoliters.”
MUNJI = Multi Use Nozzle Jet Injectors
my daughters friend just landed the job ,a stay at home job ,just motoring patients that have hep c and are being cured ,my niece was one of the very lucky ones that was cured,i hate the thought that out veterans can’t get the proper care .i am gonna tell my daughters friend to talk to her company,that makes the cure,about a deal with the govt to help veterans,what do i have to lose?
There’s several million of us here in CA ., injured workers that haven’t gotten their illnesses or injuries taken care of by anyone in the medical field and when I stated the least of the least, we don’t get it from Medicare either..
We’re just left to suffer and just die off without any care. period, all starting in 1986..
I wish I could go back to the midwest too,. ..
My posts don’t take, Mr. Ben.
Sometimes it does that. I copy and paste my post to a docx. and check back later. if it doesn’t show up then I can repost it by copying and pasting it.
@ Asknod. Sometimes there is a delay in the local server where records are updated in the CDN. If you push a “/?” at the end of the page URL, it should manually update the page on your end to see the comment.
At least yours got answered.
Ben, We have the Pedojet jetgun manual. I just converted it into a word searchable .pdf. You can now win every jetgun claim that comes your way. The presumption of Administrative Regularity is rebutted. If any jetgun nose was contaminated by blood from a botched injection (read flinching) it was considered hors d’ combat and sent to the autoclave according to the manual. Of course we know that didn’t happen. All those pictures showing improper technique and throw in some Layno v. Brown and the five senses of perception. As long as nobody goes off the reservation and starts blowing bubbles about their alien abduction, then the credibility thing will hold water.
https://asknod.wordpress.com/2015/05/08/the-holy-grail-of-jetguns-a-word-searchable-manual/
Great to meet you in SF.
Alex sends
After going thru years and boxes of numerous medical-legal reports, mine & others, it started with injuries & illnesses & by the last report, the injuries & illnesses via each subsequent report slowly disappeared, We had no injuries or illnesses but we did have a mental illness, insured by “our” attorneys too. by the time we were to get our benefits. There was little to none, injuries, illnesses or benefits The same with SSA/Medicare. They gave us the least amount of benefits on “mental disorders” and that money comes out of state taxes, wc premiums(risk management) & some fed funds but certainly NOTHING from the SSA FICA itself that we paid into for many decades until we reach “retirement age”. . We were to get rehab twice, once thru employer’s WC & then the SSA, but neither happened, leaving us without the ability to take care of ourselves to further be given life liberty & the pursuit of happiness , rather, us just being looked at just on being on the dole. Our Gold watch retirement award. broke & broken. This is all rigged by our own congress.
Now through the IT, injuries & illnesses, causation’s, real diagnosis’s and or the medical necessities needed to help will all but disappear faster BUT our mental disorders/illness will stay forever. This is more than character assassination to discredit us all., this is all to criminalize those of us ( then we can be locked up as mental cases in a jail cell and that is big business TOO) who were deliberately hurt or made ill, It s a diversionary tactic. to take away the blame from, the original crime and criminals from whence it came, thus it is in further keeping to denying and delaying any/all benefits, if they admit there’s an injury or illness, then that will not only show the deliberateness of medical horrors but also the benefits costs go soaring but instead they’re just, leaving us to just suffer and die off, crimes of inhumanity.
Then those who are responsible cannot be held accountable in any way, after they’ve pillaged & plundered.
The Art of War. in modern times.
Wee worth the 14 minutes of how the VA has exposed 1000’s to infectious agents through improper sterilization procedures (the VA blamed the instructions)
VA Regional Counsel and local lawyer Tammy Kennedy denied these two vets’ claims for the hepatitis virus after admitting the VA messed up. Both tested positive and now the VA has left them to fend for themselves. The VA had another chance to show it is really trying to clean itself up and admit to this. Taking responsibility would have gone so far but instead the VA stayed its course and denied each claim by using the legal system. What happened to Tammy Kennedy? She moved to DC. and was promoted. As if this video she is/was the acting General Counsel and the top lawyer for the entire VA
I picked up HepC in 1973, worked with it till 2007 and then became ill. Fortunantly I had my own health insurance, Blue Cross. After two failed courses of Ribaviran and Interferon for a total of 18 months of pure hell, So my HepC was one of those hard to cure genotypes. My doctor mentioned that there were some new drugs on coming out and I should wait for them. I did and got on one of the first rounds of treatment after FDA released it. Sofosbuvir cost 1000 per pill. I needed 90 of them. I also had to take ribaviran, so that with the sofosbuvir was running close to 34,000 for one month of treatment. Gilead Sciences out of Foster City CA, make this drug and will work with the patient to pay the copay if you can’t. One course of treatment is over 90,000, one liver transplant 250,000. I’m no math wize but even I can see where the emphasis should be.
But it did work and it was tons cheaper than a liver transplant would have been. So I don’t see why VA is being so penny pinching about the prescription of this drug. It will save money in the long run.
Thank God. I am so glad to hear something positive. I realize you had a tough go at it, but the final outcome is great. On with a wonderful life.
Just an FYI, the website is having technical problems today. I’m looking into the problems.
Well, the state of this website today is apropos of today’s subject on infectious diseases or commonly grouped under name “Viruses”. Perhaps only a coincidence, but I stopped believing in coincidences long long ago for many reasons. Patterns are more easily recognized and acknowledged when that *something* prevents people from more freely communicating…like today, on this website. However, my aggressive Norton 360 Antivirus has not detected anything from this site, so if you were hacked Ben, hope it all works out and is a simple fix.
At the VA didn’t do it on purpose. Or did they?
Berney Madoff didn’t do it on purpose, or did he?
This would be much more of a Koch Brothers, Inc. type of thing. They own Big Pharma.
Ben, You have to get up to speed on HCV txments. The old Bocepravir/Telepravir/ Olysio antivirals came out at the dawn of time as the first NS3A protease inhibitors (2011). They are old school and no longer used by anyone but VA. Sovaldi and now (2015) the Harvoni combo of Sovaldi/Ledipasvir are the new NS5A inhibitors and are 99% effective. I approached my VA hep minder in Fall 2013 and asked for the Sovaldi txment. I got a tentative “summer of 2014” waveoff and still have not heard from them. I’m stage 4 and at the top of the triage chart but no dice. I finally went the 80/20 Medicare route and am now cured. I suppose VA will eventually notice I’m still getting a comp check in 2018 and ask me to come in to find out why I’m not dead yet.
As an added inducement, I just got and published the Pedojet Operations manual in a word-searchable .pdf for NOVA guys to use in these cases. It absolutely puts a fork in the Presumption of sterility. If the nose got blood on it, it had to be declared hors d’ combat and autoclaved. Never happened. This is the best exculpatory evidence to come along for jetgun filings in years. https://asknod.wordpress.com/2015/05/08/the-holy-grail-of-jetguns-a-word-searchable-manual/
VA is down- triaging Vets who legitimately should have been treated before transplant or immediately after. I get that. X dollars for pharmaceuticals only goes so far every year and severely cuts into VISN bonuses.
And for the record, I have a lot of Vets who were never told they had HCV after they were tested in the late 90s- early 2000s. We usually find out when we file and go fetch the Vista VHA records. My doctor told me in the 90s ” Hey, you have the antigen for this thing. Your blood is valuable. They may be able to make a vaccine out of it some day.” That’s how far off base they were… and still are.
The miracle is HCV came out of the closet (again) and someone actually is acknowledging it.
Clear Prop.
Those are figures for Vets that attend the VA.. congressional testimony put the numbers at 2.6 million or higher for all vets.
The VA Testimony before the Subcommittee on Benefits Committee on Veterans’ Affairs, U.S. House of Representatives, April 13, 2000, Gary A. Roselle, M. D., Program Director for Infectious Diseases, Veterans Health Administration, Department of Veterans Affairs, state, “One in 10 US Veterans are infected with HCV”, a rate 5 times greater than the 1.8% infection rate of the general population.”
And whose responsibility is it to monitor our care? CLUE: It is the patient’s.
And for years we have had internet access to our VA medical recordds, labs, summaries, etc. Of course the VA is negligent for failing to notify us of any abnormal conditions, but we have to own our bodies, which we cannot do if we refuse to be aware of our own records.
Alternate headline:
“50,000 veterans with heads in sand ignorant that they have Hepatitis”
I understand your point to a certain extent, but what you are also saying is “car mechanic should have detected size of brain tumor earlier”, or “hair dresser should have known of cancer after looking in mirror”.
Now excuse me while I finish my medical degree so I can understand what certain test results mean.
VA secretly tested Vets for hep c long before the records became electronic. And many still don’t know, even though the VA does… didn’t think it important to add to the physical records let alone electronic records nor to tell them.
Vets are lab rats for pharma just like certain medical employees & private patients. The CDC is not about stopping strains of communicable pathogens but collection source of imposed data for the pharmaceuticals corporations for profit.
While towards the end of my employment in 1992 , I was forced to take a Ruebella Titre blood test or get terminated. At the time I took it to the Union & they didn’t do anything. Come to find out, that I already had done the this test pre-employment with kaiser and that what they did was illegal.. Collecting blood samples, for vaccines on their women employees several times while I was and for what reasons, because one blood test or type wasn’t enough? We were nothing but lab rats in a many of ways including psychological & physical,, how much abuse can you take with meds galore. .
MRSA was spread so kaiser could forge with making a new vaccine. They have their own pharma. .C-Diff is another. The reason I speak to this is that those who have any infectious diseases,most of this was was done deliberately. Anyone who sells vaccines too, are shareholders including doctors, clinics, pharamcies(neighborhood and walmart too). One Scientist for Phizer(aiser) was exposed to a virus because she spoke against health & safety working conditions. She was fired & still has an unknown strain of a virus in her body causing neuro seizures. She stated too, that having 4 strains of H1N1 at one time was manufactured., the little franken meds The impossibility .of having 4 strains of any infectious disease, one right after the other, is just that, an impossibility.. The CDC would know that. Don’t forget that they are a non profit(collecting federal funds is their real life blood as are federal entities). but with their THE CDC inhumane part allowed the PROLIFIC GROWTH of HIV.
So as a general population (vets too) are just here to make us, as many as possible, to be used as lab rats, make sick & churn up the profits.
WHY should MEDICARE/SSA take the responsibility.of paying for medical care & any wage benefits. Well, both we paid into AND, the other is that it takes away the responsibility and accountability away from the DOD./VA from whence this all came about, the injuries and or illnesses and now as disabled vets, is all deliberate. The DOD/VA doesn’t mind getting money from the tax payers, they just don’t want to share it for the vets., so we, the general public or vets pay for the injuries or illnesses caused by “employers” from what we earned from doing our job..
There is nothing more TRUE than hiding the truth of those who create the circumstances to make you sick, sicker & sickest and profit from it all..
AND please don’t think the SSA/Medicare is any better, because it helping hide the truth of your illnesses or injuries because they are all one & the same. One federal agency protecting the other, so the taxpayer keeps paying for more & more, thus giving a reason to hike up more taxes from those that pay most of the taxes.. Hiding the truth of impairing anyone is the idea and it’s because someone is going to save or make money and it isn’t the general public or vets.
One scientist for university of Ill was tainted with the plague, an experiment he was working on. Because he wasn’t doing enough to secure 150,000,000 he didn’t get his antibiotics per his supervisor. He lived two weeks of misery till he died. The FBI was looking into it as was the Ill. AG office. even though they had HARD evidence.
ALL FOR SOME TO GET MONEY AT ANY COST. WE’RE THE BAIT..
.ITS INSIDIOUS & SINISTER.
THE TRUTH IS STRANGER THAN FICTION..
This is kind of a shocker to me. In the mid to late 90s, I thought it was well known that veterans had a high rate of Hep C, more so because it was not well known or tested for prior to then. I also recall the VA advertising about this. It must have been another way for the VA to say, “hey, we need more money to treat this”, and then used the money elsewhere.
Seem’s to me the DOD/VA want to deny any VET the aid they need. I reference all the different colored defoliants that were used,stored and tested on Okinawa during the 60’s while the Vietnam war was in it’s full intensity. The DOD knowing 80% of all supplies for Nam went by air or ship from Okinawa and yet if they are able to stand on their complete deniability of these facts,WE WILL ALL BE DEAD and that’s the rest of the story!!!
Sadly, I can believe a doctor would do this and keep results from a patient. Often VA doctors do not tell me my test results.
The more I read about VA Health Care, the more scared of it I become. Is there a God up there who will force these people to change?!!
I had just been to Jyoti Sahni, MD. Infectious Disease in the Saginaw, MI. VA. I have been turned down for the cure. Not sick enough. I believe I got it thru the jet guns in 1974. They will pay for the diagnosis, but not the cure. I want to apply for compensation as it has disabled me. Although I do fear the VA and the government. I do not know why I do, and do not know how they can hurt me. Guess they have me where they want me. A “No Action Veteran”. I think I need help in this matter and others with the VA. Any suggestions?
Are you talking about the air gun inoculations ,we used to get ? You know not to beat a dead horse either from neglagiance or no regard for Vetetans I contacted C-diff last year and I was not on anti Biotics & I never go anywhere except the VA CBOC ,I am more mad at myself than anyone I sat there and let the nurse put that needle in me ,she did not take it out of sterile wrapper and did not swab injection site never again ,I have never in my life been as sick. I have switched teams and asked my new PCP if while checking my blood work to check my PSA level he straight up told me no,I and asked who was checking before and why ,I told him it was the team I transferred from and that cancer runs in my family & that the VA was pumping 200 mgs of testosterone in me every other week ,that I asked to come off of they said no ,they said my levels were low ,but from research ,I found that testosterone therapy can cause cancer ,But just like everyone else I am paying for my civillian healthcare through SSI ,My new Dr has ordered complete blood work up,I also gave him the last 14 years medical disk and hard copy of the mountains of medicines I was on he just said oh my but I believe he will truely help me .
Larry Ross,
There is a Veterans site http://www.asknod.org that specializes in HCV claims. Everything you need to know about HCV claims can be found there.
In short all you need is one or more good Nexus letters to win the claim. Get several Nexus letters to insure a win. There are examples of Nexus letters on ASKNOD. Don’t give up, file a claim stating you got HCV from jetguns or blood transfusions if you had a transfusion on active duty.
Don’t Quit and you will win. With a Nexus letter that says “near constant debilitating episodes” you will get rated at 100% P&T.
Always thought there was a connection between airgun inoculations and Hep C .Medic 76-79 . On post immunization team two years in a row , gave thousand of injection per day , with guns .We where instructed no need to clean them between troops .Frequently they would flinch and draw blood , still no cleaning of equipment .We were never given manuals on injectors .I was treated for Hep C with robotic on and Intrawest for 11 months with subsiquent sever depression and emergency stop of treatment in 2001. Negative according to VA since .Has to be a connection with vets five times more likely to have Hep C .Also learned when I attended nursing school after service that two live vaccines should never be given at one time .But as medics we sometime gave six or seven at a time .
Larry Ross, I can tell you from experience how the VA will hurt you. 2000, I went to the Northport VA, NY. Reeling from diagnosis of silent heart attack( from atherosclerosis, COPD, severe hypertension, failed Spinal Surgeries, GERD, and service connected seizure disorder and depression due to General Health. Yes, it is in the DSM-4
i went there with all my medications prescribed by private MDs. Assigned a team, I was not allowed to take my pain medications( non-opioid), my cardiac medications were changed by foreign medical students
Of Course, I questioned, asked for discharge.
Walked out with a sentence of mental illness to start off the millenium.
They do spread that information around. Character Assasinations. Just reading my medical records makes me fume as to how they lie and yet have absolutely nothing to substantiate.
But they targeted the wring veteran. Eventually, supposedly, the Medical Director resigned, as I was told. False, He was transferred. The Chief Information Officer resigned as well. I file privacy violation actions.
What works with these crooks?
File Freedom of Information Law supported requests for Financial Statements. Money comes in , where is it going ? All fiction.
contracts that made no sense whatsoever.
It is a federal crime for federal employees to steal.
SSVF is riddled with miney going to high salaries and helping illegal aliens by being put in general housing programs. Even lied as to how much money they get to house homeless veterans.
Request financial statements from your VAMC under FOIL. It takes a couple years. there is a reason you have to put down, I forget but its something like for public good.
Do it. Maybe, the larcenous senior executive will kill themselves instead.
I appreciate the encouragement. I am getting highly motivated to finally take some action. Many more vet should share the good bad and ugly of their case. We can all learn by sharing and not to be afraid of “big brother”. You realize that for them it would be better for us to die than unite. If we unite they become exposed. That would lead to turmoil. Turmoil may lead to war. War may lead to peace.
Ben – You’re site’s CSS (and some javascript generated items as well) isn’t loading so all folks are seeing is text, images and large blank areas that use CSS to render correctly. Also, there’s no sidebars at all. I’m also seeing a lot of CSS errors for your site in Firefox’s built-in “web developers” tools as well. My suggestion is to clear your browser’s cache as well as cookies and refresh the page. At that point you should see the problems. Without clearing your browser’s cache, your browser is filling in the missing details from it’s browser history of the site.
Thanks. No idea why the site is loading like that in IE. It works in Chrome and Firefox. I’m hoping I did not get hacked again.
Ben, your site has just gone haywire and you should take a look. Maybe today’s article hit a “raw nerve” with the VA…or possibly my comment, but something is awry with your site…not my PC.
What are you noticing? It looks normal right now.
Full blank screens that absolutely do not look ‘right’. on Windows 7, Internet Explorer, FireFox, browsers, all the same. This reply window is even taking-up entire screen and NO OTHER website does this on my end, only yours. I use Norton 360 as well and scans show all okay. Unless of course this huge blank screen, having to scroll down, then to only find the page has actually changed to LONG BLANK FIELDS, then when I find an article, it makes me have to navigate again. Just wondering if the “powers that be” do not like this exposure of today’s topic or perhaps I am being paranoid, but my eyes certainly are not deceiving me. Perhaps it’s a scripting thing or HTML thing…do not know, but thought to let you know what’s on our receiving end.
Thanks for today’s article…a raw nerve for me, having my aforementioned life experience with military and VAMC’s medical misgivings.
Ben, last post on this, regarding my post of my experience, I absolutely love my country and many years in service, but I kept that original Red Cross notification I got on-base all those years…evidence makes a huge difference in a claim. (not to beat a dead horse, but your site is still wacko, for instance, your usual rectangle that’s a blue border and is the Voc Rehab link…it stretches across my whole screen, even this field is largely across whole screen, pages and pages of blank spaces, glitching, and although I can reply, and last one on what’s going on here, someone I correspond in a musical instrument forum in Netherlands told me it looked like something ‘odd’ happening, and he is a code nerd–FYI)
This topic should bring a lot of experiences in other comments, so it would be sad if others that are not as close as YOU are to your server are seeing/experiencing…cannot even find your email/contact link on this site….hmmm.
Been there, done that, but with me receiving the little “gifts from Military Surgery while active duty”….in my case, I live with both Hepatitis B *AND* HIV from an appendectomy that required blood transfusions. I even have a rather rare blood type. Became incredibly sick for a month and half while on medical convalescent leave immediately after surgery. Military Dr.’s totally missed this or just did not bother to even screen when I was having everything coming out of both ‘ends’, and it was an on-base Red Cross Blood Drive two months post-surgery when I could donate blood again that a week or two after donating I received a registered/mail letter of URGENCY from the Red Cross to IMMEDIATELY see my Base Dr. WITH THE LETTER stating either UNSTERILE SURGICAL ENVRONMENT and/or TAINTED/UNTESTED BLOOD from military surgical procedure. (the HIV showed-up much later and is a very rare/slow progressing HIV Strain that’s incredibly hard to treat.
I ended-up leaving the VAMC’s care for private/civilian Medicare because the VA **REFUSED to acknowledge** my Civilian Infectious Disease Dr.’s GENOTYPE and PHENOTYPE Tests to determine what strain I had to determine what treatment to use…these are VERY expensive and QUALIFYING TESTS…oh, I should mention I am not a drug user NOR in ANY “high risk group”, nor sexually active.
The VA only wanted to place me on what was available on VA’s “Drug Formulary” and THE ONLY RX that would even be effective with both my HIV/Hep B was a rather new and expensive three drug cocktail ($2,888. for *30 Tablets a MONTH) (Look up ‘Atripla’ drug to see I am not making this up). The VAMC near me also had just built a brand new multimillion facility and STILL REFUSED to place an Infectious Disease Specialty Clinic, so it meant riding on a VA van for 70 miles to another VAMC, which was an all day affair and the VA simply refused to acknowledge my Dr.’s lab reports and her notes…and guess what? She worked for the CDC for years and then in 1980’s aggressively led research and development of the very drug cocktail and others I am currently on. She is quite a nationally recognized Dr./PhD in her field.
I as well as other Veterans have been on the VA’s mass mailings in past warning Vets they need to get tested because of VA dental and Gastro Dr.’s using unsterile practices, infecting 1000’s of Veterans with all the Hep’s and HIV.
My Civilian Infectious Disease Dr. told me to run away FAST from the VA and simply use my SSDI/Medicare I had while still waiting for my 100% Svc. Connection, which encompasses many other health issues and she continues to affirm that had I chose to follow the VA’s DEADLY METHODS OF TREATMENT, I would have been dead years ago…this HIV strain I have is a VERY rare mutation strain that had not been seen since mid-1980’s and a sneaky slow progressor.
My own brother whom lives in another State has ALSO been on several mass mailings waning about possible infection of aforementioned chronic conditions as well.
Needless to say, the VA did not fight me on my collective health conditions and am 100% P&T and have Medicare/SSDI…yes, the VA can be deadly for your health. Luckily, I am living proof and still kicking but each and every day is a mixed bag of health issues and major medication side effects, plus all the PTSD and Severe Anxiety from other crap.
You cannot make this crap up!
I did have quite the fight with Soc. Sec. SSDI but with my Senator’s help, finally won. The HUGE problem is the VA **REFUSED** to share/communicate data with Soc. Sec. and Soc. Sec. would NOT share info with the VARO.
It was quite a quagmire doing BOTH claims at same time while in and out of hospital but I did it and too quite a toll on me.
Do a YouTube search and you will find many Veterans infected with Infectious Diseases from either while Active Duty and/or VAMC’s.
I am very slowly working on a book about my entire experience, if for anything, my own therapy if I cannot publish for obvious reasons of fear of retaliation.
Prayer helped me through all of this and to this day. Sorry so long but this touched directly on a very raw nerve that I continue in cognitive therapy about to this day. Now, where’s that Xanax bottle?
namnibor, you’ve been saying the truth of it all. AND it does happen in the private sector to us injured workers. We waited years to get our medicare/ssa after were injured and denied medical treatment(many of us should’ve had free in lieu of medical care per wages. but got medicare instead AND the lowest amount called SSI not SSDI. If they wait long enough, one can die and or cost less if you delay long enough, IN ANY CASE, we’re the losers and who suffer..
There are trillions of health care pensions /pensions/WC MONEY GOING SOMEWHERE. such as with those who runs the DOD/VA.. TRILLIONS of dollars absconded. Kaiser built many facilities too over the years but the care still remains the same, crappy at best. THAT’S ALL MEDICAL CARE IS NOW.
Just another scheme to steal and end up in the SWISS banks.
Doctors & lawyers(not all) have bank accounts there too.
Can’t make this stuff up and hope not all of the money is gone.
Truth is stranger than fiction. and the hardest to reveal..
I agree…except I actually remained in this State specifically for the really awesome healthcare I receive at the major medical center I go to…Medicare, and civilian. I would really love to live in a more mountainous State rather than the Midwest, but my health trumps it all.
Just wanted to make the positive point that healthcare is not crappy *everywhere*.