The special on Bob Woodruff last night was fascinating, and while I was a little skeptical about such a focus on one newsman when tens of thousands of troops are suffering from injuries, the program did a good job of integrating the broader issues into showing a process of recovery for Woodruff that was, frankly, miraculous. The head injury he suffered in an IED attack was so severe, doctors ultimately had to remove 14 centimeters of his skull, replacing it with a "plastic rendition." The footage of him relearning words through his little kids showing him flashcards was heartbreaking, as was much of what his family went through.
Woodruff, of course, got the absolute best available care, and has a massive media outlet through which to talk about his story. Regular readers of this blog know that a huge number of those injured in Iraq are not so lucky. And it turns out, according to Woodruff's reporting, there may be many more injured than the government is reporting:
While the U.S. Department of Defense says that there have been about 23,000 nonfatal battlefield casualties in Iraq, Woodruff discovers -- through an internal VA report -- that more than 200,000 veterans have sought medical care for various ailments, including more than 73,000 diagnoses for mental disorders.
Nicholson plays down those figures, telling Woodruff, "A lot of them come in for dental problems. We're providing their health care."
Woodruff reports that even these numbers may not tell the whole story: According to unreleased data from the Department of Defense, at least 10 percent of Iraq and Afghanistan veterans may have sustained a brain injury during their service.
The ABC News anchor reports: "That could mean that of the 1.5 million who have served or are now serving in Iraq and Afghanistan, more than 150,000 people could have a brain injury that may be undiagnosed and unrecognized by the casualty numbers from the Department of Defense."
While everyone with symptoms of a brain injury may not need extensive treatment, Woodruff learns that the Department of Defense is not screening all returning soldiers, despite recommendations from the Defense Department's own Defense and Veteran's Brain Injury Center.
Woodruff says that he and others at ABC News will continue to report on this story because "the human cost of war is sometimes overlooked," and injured veterans "need support that matches their sacrifice."
Certainly some of those numbers are not Iraq casualties, and many may in fact be "dental problems," but I don't think 73,000 mental disorders include any dental work, and it's offensive to hear so many soldiers needing medical care being so easily dismissed. The fact that returning soldiers aren't even being screened for brain injuries -- which are exactly the kind of injury most likely from the vast majority of attacks in Iraq, bombs and other explosions, and which often don't present obvious symptoms but can have crippling long-term effects -- is disgraceful.
Woodruff gets this part exactly right: Injured veterans "need support that matches their sacrifice." I guess this administration disagrees.
