(The Center Square) – Perhaps with a make America healthy again slogan and securing backing from new Health and Human Services Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr., a North Carolina congressman’s proposal for veterans might have a lane to the finish line.
Access to hyperbaric oxygen therapy by all American veterans has been proposed by U.S. Rep. Dr. Greg Murphy, R-N.C. If it sounds familiar, it is – he’s made it each of his first three terms and earlier this month tacked on a fourth.
This time could be different. Murphy says the Biden administration was strongly opposed. And Kennedy, like the president who picked him, is a bit of a disrupter.
A practicing physician by trade, Murphy filed the Veterans’ National Traumatic Injury Treatment Act. The therapy, known as HBOT, involves treating veterans with 100% oxygen under two atmospheres of pressure in hypobaric chambers.
“America tragically loses 17 or more veterans to suicide each day,” the fourth-term Republican said. “Post-traumatic stress disorder and traumatic brain injuries are far more prevalent among the veteran community than most understand.
“Hyperbaric oxygen therapy is a promising treatment option that offers a lifeline to veterans with PTSD/TBI on whom other treatments have failed. HBOT has undergone extensive and rigorous evaluation that enjoys great evidential support, not only in the U.S. but other countries, most notably out of Israel.”
The proposal asks the “secretary of Veterans Affairs to establish a pilot program to furnish hyperbaric oxygen therapy to a veteran who has a traumatic brain injury or post-traumatic stress disorder.” Doug Collins is the VA leader.
The treatment involves about 40 sessions. More than two dozen veterans in North Carolina have participated.
In a broader study, HBOT produced “one of the greatest reductions in PTSD symptoms in a four-week period with any reported treatment.”
Prevention of suicide is the most compelling advocacy for the treatment. It is not, however, approved by the federal government. It classifies TBI and PTSD as mental illness and approves drugs and counseling for treatments.
The resolution is cosponsored by Reps. Don Davis and Deborah Ross, Democrats from North Carolina; Jennifer Kiggans and Rob Wittman, Republicans from Virginia; Republicans Derrick Van Oden of Wisconsin, Sherri Biggs of South Carolina, and Nicole Malliotakis of New York; and Democrat Marilyn Strickland of Washington.