Big changes are coming to veterans’ health care starting this month, and NJ Spotlight News interviewed New Jersey’s former health commissioner and current Under Secretary for Health for the U.S. Department of Veterans Affairs Shereef Elnahal to break it all down.
In what’s being called the largest-ever expansion, the U.S. Department of Veterans Affairs will allow any veteran exposed to toxins and other hazards during military service to be eligible for VA health care without first having to apply for VA benefits. The expansion takes effect on March 5, which the VA says is years earlier than originally called for in the PACT Act.
“Any veteran who is exposed to a toxin during their service, regardless of whether they were deployed, is also eligible to enroll for VA healthcare,” said Elnahal, the VA’s Under Secretary for Health. “We anticipate that tens of thousands of additional veterans in states like New Jersey will qualify, and we won’t know until we get that demand signal as of Tuesday.”
