What We Owe to the Americans Returning Home from Iraq (ContributorNetwork)

COMMENTARY | According to a December 15 post in the Yahoo! News Blog, The Envoy, the United States has lowered its flag in Baghdad and declare its 9-year military mission in Iraq over. An estimated 4,500 Americans and 100,000 Iraqis died during the course of the war. And for those who served our country and have returned home, a lifetime of recovering from the scars of that service have only just begun.

The question that remains is whether the U.S. government is going to step up and offer its own service to the thousands of men and women now suffering from post-traumatic stress disorder due to their time in Iraq.

According to Patriot Outreach, post-traumatic stress disorder is the most common psychological injury of the war, striking more soldiers returning from both Iraq and Afghanistan than clinical depression or anxiety. In any given war, an average of 10 percent to 20 percent of those serving will be afflicted. Nearly all of the 1.4 million United States military active duty and reserves personnel have been exposed to battle conditions in Iraq and Afghanistan. That's a lot of PTSD to contend with.

According to military.com, in May, the 9th Circuit federal appeals court ordered the Department of Veterans Affairs to overhaul its mental health care system, noting that an average of 18 veterans a day commit suicide and it takes an average of four years to fully provide the mental health benefits owed to veterans.

I believe that the United States must do better in providing these services to our returning veterans. Regardless of the economic crisis and deep, looming cuts to defense and health care budgets or how any one individual may feel about the war or are reasons for getting into it, we have an obligation to address the needs of these soldiers who have served in our country's name. They put their lives on the line. We owe it to them to do what it takes to give back the lives to those who are now suffering from PTSD.

Source: http://us.rd.yahoo.com/dailynews/rss/iraq/*http%3A//news.yahoo.com/s/ac/20111215/us_ac/10687019_what_we_owe_to_the_americans_returning_home_from_iraq

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