Blue Water Navy Agent Orange

[Berta]

(I was unable to post this in the Agent Orange foruym- possibly due to heavy fog here???

I have had a a google alert for Blue Water AO vets for a long time and still get articles from news outlets in many different parts of the US.

I think the Herald Times is based in Indiana:

"For veterans: VA prepares to tackle backlogged disability claims
Steven MillerGuest columnist

The Department of Veterans Affairs announced Oct. 13 that it is preparing to hire more than 2,000 new employees to assist in disability claims processing. 

According to the VA, more than 204,000 backlogged disability claims are in the Veterans Benefits Administrations' disability claims queue. Many of the claims result from the VA adding three new diseases to the Agent Orange presumptive list. The presumptive list contains the diseases that the VA will presume to have been caused by exposure to Agent Orange.
The three new conditions are hypothyroidism, bladder cancer, and Parkinsonism. With the three new conditions, the VA now recognizes 17 diseases caused by Agent Orange exposure. The other diseases are AL amyloidosis, chronic B-Cell leukemias, chloracne, diabetes mellitus type 2, Hodgkins disease, ischemic heart disease, multiple myeloma, non-Hodgkins lymphoma, Parkinson's disease, peripheral neuropathy (either secondary to diabetes or having occurred within one year of leaving Vietnam), porphyria cutanea tarda, prostate cancer, respiratory cancers and soft tissue sarcomas."
https://www.heraldtimesonline.com/story/news/local/2021/10/25/veterans-va-prepares-tackle-backlogged-disability-claims/612605000
The article does not mention Bkue Water Navy but still I bet many veterans, to include Blue Water Navy veterans do not know of the newer presumptives, highlighted in this article.
While I believe it is true that VA will hire "More than 2,000 new employees to assist in disability claims processing. "
the fact remains that the training they need will be extensive, time consuming, and probably cause more errors in initial denials than we can foresee.
I have no idea how many of these past BWN AO denials have been reviewed so far:
The article adds:
"Since Blue Water Navy veterans became eligible for VA benefits in 2019, the department has processed more than 45,000 claims and paid nearly $900 million in retroactive benefits. " 

https://www.legion.org/veteransbenefits/252567/va-automatically-review-thousands-blue-water-navy-claims
I did a search at the BVA under Blue Water Navy Agent Orange and 785 decisions from 2019 to 2021 popped up-
I need to take the time to assess those decisions because if a Blue Water Veteran had the proper time frame and coordinates on their ship's logs and/or their ship had already been classified as exposed to AO ( I have out the most recent AO ship's lists here) and they have a documented AO presumptive, they should not be at the BVA if someone at a RO could actually have read their evidence.
VA did a review over denied AO IHD claims when IHD became presumptive. They missed a few of us in that regard. Only because I as a widow knew of the new IHD regs, did I succeed in my claim for AO IHD.......
But that was after I cued a denial the next day.The denial was absurd yet I wonder how many widows got that type of denial and never appealed it.Maybe I should assess some AO BWN widow's claims at the BVA.
The denial was written by someone who obviously did not have a single clue on what the Vietnam incountry IHD claims were about.
They awarded in mere weeks after getting my scathing CUE -but that is only because I knew the AO IHD regulations and fortunately did not have some vet rep who also might not have had a clue on it all.
If you see at VAMCs etc a Navy vet who also has evidence of Vietnam service ( lots of vets around here wear caps and badges and medals at the local VAMC) ask them if they are aware of the Blue Water Navy AO regulations and the many AO presumptives, and ask them to come here for more info.

[Berta]

https://www.benefits.va.gov/compensation/docs/shiplist.docx

Last 2019 VA Agent Orange Ship list.