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Our heroes betrayed - Sunday Mirror
BIGdavalad:
--- Quote ---EXCLUSIVE: OUR HEROES BETRAYED
By Simon Wright And Gill Smith
THE full shocking extent of the divide between how Britain treats its war heroes compared to their counterparts in the U.S. can be revealed today.
A Sunday Mirror investigation reveals how our boys wounded in Iraq and Afghanistan - or discharged from the Army because of illness - are shamefully dumped at the back of the queue for medical treatment and paid second-rate pensions.
In contrast American servicemen are treated by the U.S. Government in a manner befitting heroes - with fast-track medical attention and the very best in long-term support.
Our findings have prompted outrage among servicemen's families and Army charities, who call today for immediate Government action to tackle the scandal.
In an unprecedented step, the Royal British Legion, which normally shies away from controversy, has accused ministers of badly letting our boys down.
The legion's director of welfare, Sue Freeth, told the Sunday Mirror: "We are extremely concerned by the lack of proper care and treatment for our returning servicemen and women. It is scandalous for a soldier injured in the line of duty to be simply placed into an already struggling NHS system and expected to wait weeks or months for treatment.
"It's true that in the U.S. wounded soldiers get far better care and receive it in specialist military hospitals equipped and able to deliver it.
"Tony Blair says our injured soldiers should take priority in the NHS, but all the evidence we have is that that is simply not happening."
Many Brits suffer the shock of being flown home and dumped on a stretched NHS system not used to dealing with horrific battlezone injuries like amputations and Post-Traumatic Stress.
Heroes like Nicholas Gilliver, John Bartley and Scott Garthley, who tell their stories here today.
Gilliver was blown up in Basra and put in a mixed ward in civilian hospital back in England Bartley has been refused his MoD pension - even though he is so ill he has lost the use of his legs and needs morphine to get through the day.
Garthley has had to spend £50,000 of his own money to recover the use of his legs rather than wait in agony for NHS help.
Contrast their experiences with those of U.S. wounded soldiers who are treated swiftly in one of 75 specialist military hospitals and given everything they and their families need to heal and recover. They also get a generous inflation-linked pension and other charitable financial benefits. Men like military policeman Bryan Anderson, who lost his legs in an Iraq bomb blast but was feted as a hero back home, had no-expense spared medical care and is having a house specially built for him by a veterans' charity. "My country made sure I got the best," he says. "They said I deserved it and I guess they're right."
Britain used to have eight specialist military hospitals but they have all been shut over the past decade - forcing troops to get treatment alongside regular civilian patients.
Defence Secretary Des Browne has pledged to establish a new military wing at Birmingham's Selly Oak hospital, where troops are currently taken. But it has yet to be finished.
Last night campaigner Rose Gentle, whose son Gordon died in Iraq in 2004, said: "The Armed Forces serving in Iraq and Afghanistan are NOT ordinary people. They come home with specialist injuries and need to be treated and looked after by their own who understand the huge trauma they have been through. They don't want to be in mixed wards in civilian hospitals where they're likely to encounter people who want to have a debate with them about the rights and wrongs of the war in the first place."
FORMER Chief of Defence Staff General Sir Mike Jackson said: "It should not be beyond the wit of man, so far as it is possible... to treat wounded soldiers within the military environment.
"The nation owes a duty of care to soldiers wounded in operations of behalf of the country."
Military expert Colonel Bob Stewart added: "We just do not have the medics in our Armed Forces and I find it an absolute disgrace. These brave servicemen and women aren't injured by accident.
They are sent into harm's way by the Government and the Government has a responsibility to give them best medical treatment."
I RELY ON CHARITY FOR A HOME FOR MY FAMILY
EX-PARA John Bartley gave 11 years of his life to the Army, was shot by a sniper and blown up by a landmine - but his biggest battle has been a vain one to get a full pension.
John, 38, who fought in the first Gulf War, is confined to a wheel chair and in so much pain he needs morphine every day.
Reliant on his wife Jill as a full-time carer, he lives near Glasgow with his three children in a house provided by a veterans' charity. In 2004, he was awarded 60 per cent of an Army pension - £750 a month. That was before his condition worsened to the point of needing a wheelchair, so he appealed for more. But last November his appeal was turned down by the War Pensions Appeal I Committee. He said: 7 "They want you to fight -but afterwards they just throw you on the scrapheap."
I HAD TO SPEND £50K ON OPS TO WALK AGAIN
CORPORAL Scott Garthley has spent £50,000 of his own money on vital operations to help him walk again - after being told to wait six months on the NHS.
Scott, 38, was blown up by an Iraqi Scud missile on the first day of the conflict in March 2003 and had horrific injuries to his spine, knees, shoulder and teeth. At Selly Oak Hospital in Birming ham, a junior doctor told him he was just badly bruised and he was sent home to rest. In agony, he finally saw an Army doctor two months later and was told he needed ops on his spine. "They said I'd have to go on a waiting list for 23 weeks," says Scott, who is single and lives in Northampton.
Instead, he paid for the £50,000 surgery. He was medically discharged from the TA in 2005 and left his civilian job through ill health. He now survives on a pension of £800 a month.
ONLY THE BEST FOR SOLDIERS IN U.S.
By Barry Wigmore in America
AMERICA has the best military hospitals in the world and troops hurt in Iraq and Afghanistan get treatment second to none.
The US has more than 200 military hospitals and medical centres around the country run by the armed forces from the Defence Department budget.
The Veterans' Administration - a vast, well-funded organisation - also looks after former military personnel who get virtually free treatment for life.
And a privately-funded charity, Fisher House, provides free housing for wounded troops' families next to the 20 major military surgical centres.
U.S. military policeman Bryan Anderson, 25, lost both legs and most of his left arm when a roadside bomb blew up the Humvee truck he was driving in Baghdad in October 2005.
"I went to wipe my face with my left hand and realised it wasn't there," says Bryan, from Illinois.
"Then I looked down. My pal grabbed my face to turn it the other way, but it was too late. I'd seen it. Both of my legs were blown off."
Close to death, Bryan was airlifted to a military hospital in the States. He was operated-on the same day and spent six weeks on a special amputees ward staffed by armed forces doctors and nurses.
His mother was given an immaculate room with all home comforts in which to live for the duration of his stay - a facility afforded to all families of injured servicemen and women.
After six weeks, he was transferred to a dedicated military rehabilitation unit nearby where he stayed for 13 months undergoing daily physiotherapy and where he was fitted with hi-tech artificial legs.
"My country made sure I got the best," he says. "They said I deserved it and I guess they're right."
He is currently staying with his parents - while a purpose-built home is built for him by the US War Heroes Foundation.
NO ROOM IN ARMY WARD FOR CPL NICK
IT was nine days before Christmas when a bomb left Corporal Nicholas Gilliver close to death.
He was travelling in an armoured Land Rover in Basra when the device detonated.
He and his driver took the full force of the blast.
The next thing Nicholas, 31, knew he was in intensive care at Selly Oak Hospital, Birmingham.
Both his legs were badly hurt and his head and torso had shrapnel wounds.
But it was what happened after he had recovered sufficiently to be moved to a general ward which left his close friends angry.
Due to bed shortages, he was put in a civilian mixed ward - instead of the dedicated military one.
Next to him were two frail and infirm elderly women and an elderly man.
Last night a close friend said: "Nicholas was a mass of tubes and very poorly. Yet you'd get people who are anti-war criticising him. So not only did he almost lay down his life for his country, he then had to justify himself as he fought to survive. It was a dreadful situation to be in - no soldier should have to put up with that."
But worse was to come. After Christmas, Nicholas, who had been on a second tour of duty in Iraq, developed a serious infection. Bacteria from the soil in Iraq had entered his blood stream from the explosion.
He had to go to a single-room isolation ward so he didn't pass on the disease.
His friend added: "The room was a disgrace - just eight metres square. The TV didn't work, nor did the phone. His clothes were piled in a corner.
"His room was near the ward entrance. The door was left open and everyone would gawp at him.
"It was extremely upsetting. Nicholas put his life on the line for his country - he deserved better treatment. He needed specialist care from people who really understood the trauma he was going through."
Last night Nicholas's father Michael, who lives near Doncaster, said: "We are extremely proud of Nicholas's Army service. He was injured doing his duty." He is now out of his isolation ward but still in hospital
However, the current head of British Armed Forces, Sir Jock Stirrup, claimed medical care was better for troops in NHS hospitals than in specialist military hospitals.
He added: "Care is best provided in a large NHS hospital. The number of in-patients at any one time is quite small and their injuries require different types of treatment. Although there are insufficient military casualties to fill a ward with any one type of injury, we can do much to create and sustain within NHS hospitals the kind of military environment and ethos that our people need."
--- End quote ---
Sunday Mirror
FTW:
It's atrocious, and fucking typical of this government that all eight specialist military hospitals have been closed within the last 10 years.
It'd be less of a joke if the NHS was actually able to offer a swift, high quality service..but we all know they can't.
For all the stick the U.S Army gets, they know how to treat their troops..this is obviously one occasion where we need to take a leaf out of their book..they seem to pull out all the stops.
Monkey Red:
Sickening! I´m fucking speechless.
Maggie May:
Perhaps they interviewed Sir Jock Stirrup after a long and liquid lunch - I can't see any other explanation for that woffle.
And for the RBL to speak out at all, let alone in such strong terms, convinces me that things are far, far worse that we've been told.
ratcatcher:
Actually, some of it is totally inaccurate. All ex servicemen are allowed to 'queue jump' in NHS hospitals where they do not have access to service hospitals. Any Veterans Welfare Service can advise them of this. They only have to inform the relevant NHS Trust they are ex servicemen and they should be fast tracked to treatment.
Thing is, Im not certain how many ex servicemen and hospital trusts are aware of this simple fact.
The debate about disability pensions for ex servicemen has gone on for a long time. My view is they should be well looked after, as should all old folk.