Loss Of Health Care For Veterans Feared

Republican plans to slow the growth of Medicare and Medicaid spending could leave tens of thousands of veterans without access to health care, Veterans Affairs Secretary Jesse Brown said Monday.

The Republicans are balancing the budget on the backs of veterans, Brown said, “and that is shameful and it is not fair.”

Rep. Tim Hutchinson, R-Ark., a member of the Veterans Affairs’ Committee, disputed Brown’s charges and said the conclusions of a report by the VA and Health and Human Services departments were “bogus.”

Hutchinson and Brown appeared on Cable News Network.

The VA-HHS report said that as many as 172,000 of the 600,000 veterans now enrolled in Medicaid, the health care program for the poor and disabled, could lose their coverage under the GOP plan to trim Medicaid spending by $182 billion over seven years.