VA to use $50M for veteran suicide prevention projects
May 21 (UPI) -- More than $50 million in federal grant money will be available to local groups to provide suicide prevention and other services for America's at-risk veteran population, the U.S. Department of Veterans Affairs announced Wednesday.
"Reducing veteran suicide starts with reaching veterans when and how it's most convenient for them," said U.S. Veterans Affairs Secretary Doug Collins.
Around $52.5 million in federal money via the VA's Staff Sgt. Parker Gordon Fox suicide prevention grant program will be directed to local organizations at a community-based level that provide an array of clinical or other emergency services for U.S. veterans, particularly suicide prevention.
In December, the Biden administration's Veterans Affairs Department noted that military veteran suicides were slightly down but remained steady.
It said in 2022 nearly 18 U.S. veterans died every day that year from suicide.
On Wednesday, Collins said one of the "best ways" to see a reduction in veteran suicide rates is to reach them where they are by working hand-in-hand with community-based groups and support other evidence-based organizations in all 50 states.
"We look forward to ensuring these funds are put to use helping veterans in need across the nation," the VA secretary stated.
The VA's Staff Sgt. Fox suicide prevention program -- named for the U.S. Army Infantry School sniper instructor at Fort Benning, Ga., who died by suicide in 2020 at age 25 -- was the topic of a congressional reauthorization hearing at the end of April after its second reauthorized round of grant funding in March 2023.
It was authorized under the 2019 Cmdr. John Scott Hannon Veterans Mental Health Care Improvement Act, which became law nearly five years ago but must be reauthorized by Congress.
Veterans Affairs officials noted since the Fox grant program's 2022 launch that it had diverted more than $157 million throughout 43 states, U.S. territories and tribal nations to some 95 organizations to financially support veteran services.
The VA said Wednesday that U.S. organizations may now apply for grant funding up to $750,000 and may further opt to renew year-to-year throughout the grant's existing timeline.
Meanwhile, grant applications are due July 18 by 4:59 p.m. EDT.
Grantees will be picked by September 30, according to VA officials.
If you or someone you know is struggling with suicidal thoughts, help is available 24/7. Call or text the 988 Suicide & Crisis Lifeline for free, confidential support.
Hashtags
Try Our AI Features
Explore what Daily8 AI can do for you:
Comments
No comments yet...
Related Articles
Yahoo
9 hours ago
- Yahoo
Tricking Veterans: Using Suicide and Mental Health Struggles as a Guise for Privatizing the VA
The opinions expressed in this op-ed are those of the author and do not necessarily reflect the views of If you would like to submit your own commentary, please send your article to opinions@ for consideration. While attention remains focused on the looming crisis of Department of Veterans Affairs employees facing termination, an even more ominous threat to veterans' health care advances unnoticed through the halls of Congress. Three pieces of legislation are gaining momentum, each crafted to systematically dismantle VA-delivered care under the guise of sympathy for veteran suicide and mental health struggles. These bills could deliver the decisive blow in a long-standing campaign by proponents determined to privatize VA health care, collapsing the system by pulling funding it needs to care for veterans. Despite promises of greater "freedom," "autonomy" and "choice," unfettered private-sector funding threatens to narrow -- rather than expand -- veterans' actual options. As resources steadily drain from VA facilities and units disappear, millions of veterans who rely on VA services -- particularly those with service-connected conditions -- will lose access to the system they prefer. Instead, those funds will go into the coffers of private health care companies. Lawmakers have repeatedly introduced legislation to grant veterans unrestricted access to privatized care, known as the Veterans Community Care Program, or VCCP. A particular emphasis has been on mental health care, where legislation has aimed to eliminate VA referral requirements entirely. None of these potential laws has made it very far, until now. Three bills are proceeding through Congress. One, the No Wrong Door for Veterans Act, secured House approval last month. The Senate Committee on Veterans' Affairs (SVAC) is actively weighing whether to follow suit. Should it do so, or if the other bills gain traction, the foundational structure of the VA system could crack. Even without legislation, we're seeing a shift underway. In the VA secretary's new budget, VA medical care funding would be cut by 17% while VCCP private-sector resources would receive a 50% boost. Veterans genuinely appreciate the convenience of community care referrals close to home, but they remain largely unaware of the devastating long-term consequences these legislative changes could bring. If veterans truly grasped the scope of what's being planned, they'd likely reject them. When the Veterans of Foreign Wars surveyed 10,000 members, an overwhelming 92% wanted the VA preserved as the primary health care source -- not dismantled in favor of insurance cards for private providers. A Common Defense poll last week found that two-thirds of veterans oppose downsizing the VA. The Disabled American Veterans is so alarmed by the prospect of unchecked outsourcing that it published a 2023 report with the stark warning title, "A Broken Promise: What if the Veterans Health Administration Goes Away?" That question cuts right to the core. If the VA does not remain the sole authorizer of care, and receive sufficient funding to meet patient demand, the system -- which research consistently shows equals or exceeds community care in critical quality and outcome measures -- faces dismantlement. The VA will likely end up instead as a sprawling assortment of outpatient clinics. If that sounds familiar, it's the plan envisioned in the Project 2025 blueprint. The ripple effects will also reach into America's broader health care landscape. The VA serves as the primary training ground for the nation's health care workforce. Furthermore, VA research -- for countless mental and physical conditions that help both veteran and civilian populations -- would suffer crushing consequences. The VA's role as the nation's health care safety net during public health emergencies would also be severely compromised. The drive for privatization -- shifting governmental responsibilities and funding to private-sector entities -- has deep roots in anti-government politics. Over the past decade, libertarian advocates have forged a powerful alliance with health care corporations seeking lucrative access to billions of taxpayer dollars, joined by veterans' organizations positioning themselves as preferable alternatives to VA care. The strategy crystallized at a June 2014 gathering of conservative activists, where Concerned Veterans for America, backed by the Koch brothers, unveiled a plan to discredit and steadily privatize VA health care. This vision gained legislative traction two months later when Congress enacted the VA Choice Act, expanding private-sector use. The VA Mission Act of 2018 accelerated this shift through the Veterans Community Care Program, which has experienced explosive growth of 15% to 20% annually and already accounts for 40% of all VA-funded patient care. Despite these legislative changes, one essential safeguard against large-scale VA privatization has remained intact: Veterans must still receive authorization from VA staff to obtain private care. This gatekeeping function serves an indispensable purpose, ensuring the VA can allocate resources efficiently and continue investing in high-quality, innovative care within its own system. Community options are unquestionably an essential backup for veterans living far away or facing lengthy waits for VA appointments. However, excessive private-sector use risks destabilizing the VA system and jeopardizing its viability. A "Red Team" of independent health care experts concluded last year that the metastasizing growth of private-sector referrals placed the system in an "existential crisis." These allocations are draining resources from VA facilities, threatening to eliminate services and close facilities. This precarious situation is already evident under current eligibility requirements. Further statutory expansions of veterans' eligibility -- especially unfettered access -- for private-sector care would be financially unsustainable for VA direct care. Champions of privatization have introduced numerous bills designed to eliminate the requirement for VA authorization before veterans can access private care. These advocates have strategically seized upon veteran suicide and mental health crises as leverage points, exploiting the genuine sympathy these urgent issues generate to advance their broader privatization agenda that bears little connection to improving veterans' mental health. The underlying statistics certainly warrant concern: Veteran demand for mental health services has continued to climb relentlessly for years, outstripping the VA's funded capacity, while the veteran suicide rate remains persistently entrenched at levels approximately 50% higher than that of the general population. However, the proposed solutions reveal an inconvenient contradiction. Expanding outsourced mental health care would move veterans away from higher-quality, more timely treatment toward a fragmented private system ill-equipped to address their needs. The VA is widely considered the gold standard for treating psychological wounds. Compared to VA mental health clinicians, VCCP providers are far less likely to utilize evidence-based psychotherapies, receive mandatory training in military sexual trauma and suicide prevention, or seamlessly integrate mental and physical health care. Even the VA Mission Act recognized this disparity, citing VA mental health providers as possessing unique "special expertise" that distinguishes them from their civilian counterparts. Similarly, the VA's suicide prevention initiatives exceed private-sector efforts. Each of the VA's 170 medical centers employs dedicated suicide prevention coordinators who collaborate with VA clinicians to oversee suicide risk screening, expedited mental health appointments, follow-up after missed appointments, safety planning, and medical record flagging. Annual suicide prevention and lethal means safety training is mandatory for all VA providers. Veterans receiving all their care through community programs experience higher suicide rates than those treated exclusively within VA facilities. The privatization push also wasn't driven by the private sector's capacity to deliver care more quickly. Most American counties lack a single psychiatrist, while 45% of rural counties have no psychologist. Veterans wait longer for mental health appointments through the VCCP than within the VA system itself. The VA system still has plenty more work to get done. Veterans currently wait an average of 17 days for a mental health appointment, while those requiring more intensive care face a 16-day delay from initial screening to admission into residential rehabilitation programs. In 2017, Jeff Miller, the recently departed chairman of the House Committee on Veterans' Affairs (HVAC), began working as a lobbyist for billionaire Steven Cohen, founder of the Cohen Veterans Network mental health clinic chain. Cohen objected to the VA's policy requiring prior authorization before reimbursing for private care. He sought to eliminate this regulation, allowing veterans to walk into his clinics, receive services, and send the VA the bill afterward -- no approval needed. Miller and Cohen Network representatives met with HVAC committee members and drafted legislation abolishing the VA's authorization requirement for mental health care. These efforts gained movement when then-Rep. Mike Gallagher, R-Wis., agreed to introduce their bill. The legislation faced immediate and unified opposition from major veterans service organizations. These groups recognized that the bill would undermine not only the VA's mental health services but also threaten the integrated health care system's overall structure. Faced with this resistance, the bill was quickly withdrawn. Talking to ProPublica, a former VA official presciently warned at the time, "If you start trying to carve into government money in veterans' care to feed things like the Cohen Veterans Network, that's actually privatization. It's going to be death by a thousand cuts." In 2019, veteran suicide statistics seemed to portray a devastating picture. Despite a decade of well-conceived efforts, the numbers simply weren't budging. Twenty veterans took their lives each day, 14 of whom were not using the VA for services. The unyielding problem begged for fresh approaches. This recognition sparked genuine bipartisanship on Capitol Hill. In the Senate, John Boozman, R-Ariz., and Mark Warner, D-Va., joined forces, while Representatives Jack Bergman, R-Mich., and Chrissy Houlahan, D-Pa., did the same in the House. Together, they crafted the IMPROVE (Incorporating Measurements and Providing Resources for Outreach to Veterans Everywhere) Wellbeing for Veterans Act -- a three-year pilot program to provide federal grants to community organizations already working on the ground to identify at-risk veterans disconnected from VA health care and furnish preventive services before suicidal crises emerged. What made the Improve Act truly unprecedented wasn't just its community-leveraging framework, but its insistence that renewed funding be based on demonstrated improvements. The bill's architects mandated capturing comprehensive outcome data at multiple points to distinguish which community programs enhanced veterans' mental resiliency over a long-term period and thereby reduced suicide risk. Meanwhile, Sen. John Tester, D-Mont., SVAC ranking member, was constructing his own comprehensive veterans' mental health bill. During negotiations, he agreed to include Improve Act language in the package, later renamed the Staff Sergeant Parker Gordon Fox Suicide Prevention Grant Program after a 25-year-old Army sniper instructor who'd recently died by suicide. Tester's bill sailed through Congress, and the pilot Fox Grant Program began funding grantees in late 2022. The 18-month Fox Program review revealed a bleak picture of widespread ineffectiveness. Organizations were supposed to track participants' suicidal ideation, financial stability, mental health status and social supports before and after providing services, but most didn't do so. Out of all participating entities, only 295 people completed services and filled out at least one of the five required questionnaires. That's roughly, on average, four people per grantee -- a shockingly minuscule number. Even worse, the report failed to break down results by individual organization, making it impossible to determine whether they were helping improve veterans' well-being. As the three-year pilot approached the time for reauthorization in 2024, House and Senate committees held hearings to chart the program's future. However, applying the original renewal criteria for grantees would create a problem: If grant money was truly reserved for community programs that demonstrated improvement, many grantees would surely lose funding. The solution emerged as a sham workaround -- ensure private-sector money continued flowing by ignoring the requirement that grantees measure outcomes. Rep. Mariannette Miller-Meeks, R-Iowa, adopted this hands-off approach with her No Wrong Door for Veterans Act. It mandates a one-time initial screening while making no mention of pre and post assessment instruments designed to evaluate program outcomes and inform renewal decisions -- an omission that implicitly renders such evaluations voluntary. The potential abandonment of required pre and post comparative data troubled several lawmakers. House Democrats offered amendments to ensure continuation of outcomes tracking, but these were swiftly rejected. The No Wrong Door for Veterans Act contained two additional provisions that will accelerate privatization. One compressed VA access standards, the time limit the VA has to schedule, from 20 days to an unrealistic 3-day window for mental health referrals -- virtually guaranteeing automatic referrals to non-VA providers. Then, once Fox Grant recipients secure this expedited community care pathway, political pressure would inevitably mount to extend identical leeway to all enrolled veterans, draining more resources from VA facilities. Another provision posed an equally grave threat: The bill expands eligible grant recipients to include "mental health care entities" and permits them to offer non-emergency direct mental health treatment. This expanded scope would duplicate the mental health care provided at nearby VA and VCCP facilities, undermining the very agency it is intended to complement. A pair of other veterans' mental health bills have entered the legislative pipeline, each creating broad avenues for veterans to access private-sector services independently of VA involvement. One is the Veterans Health Act, introduced in 2023 by Jerry Moran, R-Kan., then the SVAC ranking member. The legislation includes a pilot program designed to expand access for veterans experiencing mental health and substance use disorders. Under this framework, veterans could schedule appointments directly with community providers, circumventing VA referral systems. Despite its pilot designation, the bill contains a mandate to expand this model across all health conditions throughout the entire VA system after three years. Moran reintroduced the pilot in March 2025 as part of the Veterans Access Act, which is slated for consideration this summer. The second bill -- the Recover Act -- introduced last fall by HVAC Chairman Rep. Mike Bost, R-Ill., would allocate grants to facilities for mental health services. This Cohen Veterans Network-backed legislation would create a parallel care system beyond services already available through the VA and the VCCP. This proposed arrangement raises troubling concerns about accountability. The VA would lose ability to oversee treatment furnished through these grants, while recipient facilities would face no requirement to share health records with VA providers -- a fundamental breakdown in care coordination that could leave veterans' treatment fragmented and potentially compromised. We've reached a critical juncture. The No Wrong Door for Veterans Act cleared the House in late May, leaving the Senate to make a pivotal choice: Advance this legislation or pursue legislation that retains accountability. Both the Veterans Health Act and the Recover Act are teed up for further attention. By the time America celebrates Veterans Day this fall, Washington may have delivered a mortal blow to the system uniquely designed to serve those who answered their country's call. -- Russell Lemle is a senior policy analyst with the Veterans Healthcare Policy Institute.
UPI
10 hours ago
- UPI
Supportive doctors help LGBTQ patients stay healthier
Marchers carry a pride banner in the WorldPride 2025 Parade in Washington on Saturday. A study shows supportive care boosts the health of the LGBTQ community and cuts costs. File Photo by Leigh Vogel/UPI | License Photo June 10 (UPI) -- When LGBTQ+ patients are unsure if they can be open about their identity and related health needs, it becomes more difficult for them to access high-quality health care. In our recently published research, my colleagues and I found that how LGBTQ+ people are treated at the doctor's office has a measurable effect on whether they stay up to date with lifesaving preventive care like flu shots, colorectal cancer screenings and HIV testing. Results of affirming care We examined how LGBTQ+ adults rated their health care provider across three areas: LGBTQ+ cultural competency, such as if providers used inclusive language on forms and in person; LGBTQ+ clinical competency, such as their doctor's knowledge on all aspects of their health; and experiences of discrimination, such as being told to seek care elsewhere. After analyzing survey data on the experiences of more than 950 LGBTQ+ adults from across the U.S., we saw that three clear patterns emerged. First, 34% of participants reported having positive health care experiences - meaning their providers were culturally and clinically competent about LGBTQ+ health needs, and did not discriminate against them. These patients were more likely to be up to date on at least one preventive service recommended by the U.S. Preventive Services Task Force, compared to those receiving neutral or discriminatory care. Second, 60% of participants reported having neutral experiences, when their providers were clinically competent about LGBTQ+ health needs and didn't discriminate against them, but were not culturally competent. These patients were 43% less likely to get an HIV test compared to patients reporting affirming care. Third, 6% of participants reported experiencing discrimination, when their providers were neither culturally nor clinically competent on LGBTQ+ health. These patients were 24% less likely to get a colorectal cancer screening compared to patients reporting affirming care. Most LGBTQ+ adults in our study reported neutral or even discriminatory care, which leads to avoidable health risks and higher costs for the health system. This provides additional evidence that being supportive of LGBTQ+ patients has measurable improvements for health outcomes. Why preventive care matters Preventive care saves lives and saves money. When diseases like colorectal cancer or HIV are caught early, treatments are often simpler, more effective and less expensive. When LGBTQ+ patients are made to feel unwelcome or unsafe, we found that they are less likely to get routine preventive care, ultimately driving up long-term costs across the health system. States like North Carolina and Georgia that have more health systems participating in the Human Rights Campaign's Healthcare Equality Index, which evaluates policies and practices around LGBTQ+ care, had higher rates of LGBTQ+ patients reporting positive care experiences compared to states with few participating health systems, such as Tennessee and Alabama. Other researchers have found that health systems participating in the Healthcare Equality Index have lower rates of nurse burnout and better quality of care, along with higher patient satisfaction among all patients. Public health in crisis This study was originally funded by the National Institute on Aging, but it was among the first LGBTQ+-focused projects terminated by the Trump administration in its efforts to eliminate "gender ideology." Our team has continued the work independently to ensure that the over 1,250 participants who already shared their experiences and data would not have this information sit idly. Our findings reinforce what many LGBTQ+ patients already know - nonjudgmental and competent care is not a luxury, but a public health necessity. University of Illinois Chicago. This article is republished from The Conversation under a Creative Commons license. Read the original article. The views and opinions expressed in this commentary are solely those of the author.
Fox News
a day ago
- Fox News
VA chief blasts rioters after LA clinic shuttered amid chaos: ‘Your actions are interfering with vets health'
FIRST ON FOX: Veterans Affairs Secretary Doug Collins announced Monday afternoon that a VA clinic in Los Angeles had to be suddenly shuttered as the City of Angels was ablaze in violence following ICE deportation raids. "To the violent mobs in Los Angeles rioting in support of illegal immigrants and against the rule of law – your actions are interfering with veterans' health care," Collins said. The secretary, formerly a Republican congressman from Georgia, said his agency had to make the "difficult decision" to temporarily close the LA Ambulatory Care Center. Collins told Fox News Digital that California leaders "repeatedly put the interests of illegal immigrants and criminals above those of hard-working citizens." "[N]ow, Los Angeles veterans are paying the price," he said. "We are thankful President Donald Trump has the courage to bring order and safety back to the citizens of Los Angeles – something California leaders have failed to do." Collins assured that the clinic would reopen as soon as it is safe to do so, and that veterans needing care there can reschedule or pursue telehealth options. The center is located between Skid Row and Union Station, and is just off the US-101 freeway, which was one of the highways rioters converged on over the weekend. California Highway Patrol officers were stranded in their vehicles at one point on that stretch of road, according to KABC, which reported they were subjected to projectiles being thrown by rioters during the asphalt incursion. During a recent television interview, Collins said he remains laser-focused on his agency's mission. "The president told me to do one thing and that's take care of our veterans." Fox News Digital reached out to the offices of Gov. Gavin Newsom and Mayor Karen Bass for purposes of this story.
