Wounded Warrior Project pushes forward with bill to aid veterans exposed to toxic burn pits
The Wounded Warrior Project’s “Honoring Our PACT Act” cleared its first hurdle in March of this year when it was passed in the House of Representatives. It’s now in the Senate where it appears to have bipartisan support, but still needs 60 votes to pass. If it’s passed in the Senate, it will go to President Joe Biden to sign into law. With the hope of President Biden doing so on Memorial Day.
A burn pit is a place where unwanted materials are burned in combat instead of simply leaving them behind. Typically, a large hole is dug, filled with the unwanted materials and waste, jet fuel is poured onto the pile, and it’s then lit on fire. What experts have begun to learn over the last 20+ years as WWP CEO Michael Linnington explains, “we were poisoning our own bodies by doing this type of burning.” Some experts believe as many as 3.5 million veterans may have been exposed to toxic burn pits since September 11, 2001.
As News 4 Jax notes in their story, if the Honoring Our PACT Act is signed into law, it would provide all veterans with access to health care if they have an illness that can be attributed to exposure to toxins while they were deployed.” The typical illnesses for those linked to toxic burn pits would be cancers and respiratory illnesses.
While the act awaits passage in the Senate and President Joe Biden’s signature, it seems like we’re on our way to providing some of the Americans we owe the most to some much needed and long overdue support.
Click here to read the News 4 Jax article in its entirety: https://bit.ly/3ycd4u2