AFP Newsletter - Spring 2022 ENGLISH

Armed Forces Pensioners’ / Annuitants’ Association of Canada Issue #39 • Spring 2022 Submitted by Brian Forbes, Chairman of the National Council of Veteran Associations and Executive Chair of The War Amps Note: the following is an abridged version of an article first published in Esprit de Corps magazine, Volume 30, March 2022. T he National Council of Veter- an Associations (NCVA) has strongly advocated for many years regarding the immediate granting of treatment benefits for seriously disabled Veterans prior to the completion of the applicant’s Veterans Affairs Canada (VAC) adjudication process. We believe it is absolutely essential to meet the urgent needs of such Veterans in a more timely fashion. The proposed draft amendments to the Veterans Health Care Regula- tions (VHCR), recently released by VAC, will ostensibly allow Veterans who apply for disability benefits for mental health conditions to auto- matically qualify for appropriate coverage. These amendments follow on the 2021 federal budget, which pro- posed the provision of $140 million over five years starting in 2021-22, and $6 million ongoing, to VAC. These funds are intended for a pro- gram that would cover the mental health care costs of Veterans with PTSD, depressive, or anxiety dis- orders while their disability benefit application is being processed. Increased funding is a good start and serves to recognize the preva- lence of mental health conditions among Veterans. It is unfortunate that VAC did not fully adopt the concept of automatic entitlement/ preapproval for Veterans suffering serious physical and/or mental disabilities. The draft amendments do, however, provide a significant step forward in recognizing that treatment benefits for mental health conditions should be granted im- mediately and not be dependent on the tortuous disability application process. It is hoped that VAC could ex- pand this principle so that incapac- itated Veterans with any form of serious disability – not just those requiring mental health supports – are not left in a precarious situation for many months or even years be- fore health care/treatment benefits are available to them. Of similar importance is ensur- ing the process is transparent and efficient. Disability applications for mental health conditions should be taken at face value in order for this new policy to be fully effective. This point is raised because the VAC Regulatory Impact Analysis states that, “Coverage under the Mental Health Benefits would be automatic upon validation of key information in the disability benefits application for specified mental health con- ditions…”. The phrase ‘validation of key information’ suggests the possibility of procedural obstacles. Therefore, the initial evidentia- ry requirements to satisfy VAC’s validation process should be spelled out in the VHCR amendments and with respect to any policy guide- lines issued by VAC to support this regulatory change. It is concerning that the afore- mentioned budgetary proposal was not actually implemented until April 2022, despite the appropriate- ness of additional funding having been clearly identified back in April 2021. VAC should mitigate against any further delays which would be extremely detrimental. In fact, an accelerated implementation of the new regulatory process is fully warranted, given that time is of the essence for disabled Veterans with mental health conditions who are languishing in the backlog of cases in the VAC adjudicative system. It is not without significance that over 95 percent of mental health/PTSD claims are ultimately approved by VAC. This statistic supports the premise that auto- matic entitlement just makes good administrative sense and would accelerate the necessary treatment benefits for disabled Veterans. Fur- thermore, systemic change is ab- solutely required to ameliorate the VAC benefits backlog. Prolonged processing delays have become a genuine crisis and our Veterans deserve better during these chal- lenging times where financial and health concerns have been intensi- fied by COVID-19. Major breakthrough in Veterans’ treatment benefits 2 Increased funding is a good start and serves to recognize the prevalence of mental health conditions among Veterans.