Opinion: Veterans Administration plan to change some ambulance transport coverage needs to be halted for study

Over a quarter of veterans are rural residents.
(The Daily Yonder photo)

If the Veterans Administration succeeds in changing its transportation coverage, rural towns and counties may not be able to handle the additional ambulance travel costs, write William Enyart and Doug Jameson in their opinion for The Daily Yonder. "The Veterans Administration wants to pass the cost for ambulance transport on to other agencies and local governments." With over 25% of all military veterans residing in rural areas, funding those trips will "hit rural areas hard."

Rural-living veterans often require ambulance travel. "With more than 15 million veterans eligible for VA care, there are many thousands of ground and air ambulance trips each year, and they come at a large financial cost. The VA has quietly decided that the cost is too great for it to bear," Enyart and Jameson explain. "Beginning in early 2024, reimbursements will be significantly reduced for veterans who receive ambulance rides to VA-approved hospitals. Those who receive ambulance rides to non-VA-approved hospitals will see reimbursements cut to near zero."

Why is the VA doing this now? According to many who watch the VA closely, the plan is to "create a funding gap – a crisis – that will compel other government entities to step forward and fill that void," Enyart and Jameson write. "Some combination of state, county and municipal government would see the crisis unfold and then rush forward with a funding solution because to do this to veterans is unthinkable."

The unexpected funding gap will hurt local governments that haven't had time to plan for increasing costs and "can't just find the money," Enyart and Jameson point out. "It is possible more well-off areas would be able to respond, but that doesn't account for other, more numerous. . . rural areas where so many of our fellow veterans live. . . .That leads to an even greater concern of how affected veterans might respond. Knowing costs are out of reach, will they simply forego medical treatment? Or, might they attempt another, less safe way to travel to a medical facility?" Enyart and Jameson add that private ambulance services that rely on VA funding may opt out of servicing unprofitable areas, many of which would be rural.

There is a way to prevent this disaster, Enyart and Jameson write, "First, congressional leaders should publicly call for a study to be done that examines the effect that changes to ambulance reimbursement would have on our veterans' health. Second, congressional working groups should be established and informed by veterans' affairs experts from the local, state and federal levels to determine the possibility of non-VA funding of ambulances for veterans. And, finally, the VA must pause the date that its reimbursement cuts will go into effect until the results of these efforts are fully known and examined publicly."