January 31, 2008

Army Still Lags On Mental Health Help For Soldiers

The Army's suicide rate jumped 20 percent in 2007, an apparent indicator that the military's efforts to provide adequate mental health assistance to soldiers serving in Iraq and Afghanistan are still falling short.

According to internal reports, there were 89 confirmed suicides and 32 suspected suicides last year, which was also the deadliest year for U.S. troops in Iraq so far. AP reports that about 34 of the suicides took place in Iraq.

The number of suicide attempts and self-inflicted injuries also spiked dramatically. About 2,100 soldiers tried to kill or injure themselves last year, compared with about 350 in 2002, the Washington Post reports.

Military health care specialists have openly admitted that they were unprepared for the length and scope of the war in Iraq. The nearly five-year-long war entered a crunch phase last year, when DOD ordered longer deployment schedules with shorter breaks in between. Some soldiers are on their fourth tours in Iraq since the U.S.-led invasion in March 2003.

While the current drawdown of troops is expected to continue as planned until force levels are back down to the pre-surge 130,000 this summer, there are strong indications that the reductions will freeze there. The Joint Chiefs will make their recommendations on troop levels to President Bush, and a decision on whether to pull back on the extended Army deployment schedules is also expected by then.

The Bush administration agreed to the drawdown late last year under considerable political pressure. But officials and commanders have expressed concern that reducing ground forces too quickly could put troops in a vulnerable position if sectarian or terrorist violence were to explode across the landscape as it did in 2006. AP reports that in a background-only briefing with reporters, a White House official cautioned that "it really is not determined" if conditions this summer will be amenable to further reductions.

Both Gen. David Petraeus, the top U.S. commander on the ground, and Defense Secretary Robert Gates have spoken very cautiously about the possibility of reductions this year so that no one will be surprised if they don't happen.

The new numbers on soldiers' suicides in 2007 confirm what many in the military already know: that the repeat deployments and reduced time off the battlefield are having a deleterious effect on service members' well-being. Congress included in the FY2008 Defense Authorization Bill expanded mental health care benefits and guaranteed psych evaluations within 30 days upon request.

The nuts and bolts reforms will be slow in coming, however.

"We're unable to get the mental health specialists that we're able to train and use as part of that care team," then-Acting Army Surgeon General Maj. Gen. Gale Pollock told lawmakers last March. "We have not been able to do the hiring -- even those positions were eliminated -- for a number of the nursing positions because of the national nursing shortage and the challenges that we have in hiring because of the OPM restrictions on how we can hire a nurse." OPM is the Office of Personnel Management.

Pollock said that the Army's inability to offer competitive salaries was making it "very, very" difficult to recruit civilian specialists.

According to a report from the Pentagon's Task Force On Mental Health, the Army, Navy and Air Force were well short of their targeted numbers for staff psychologists and psych interns. The armed forces were hiring civilian contractors to help compensate. The task force is making recommendations to Gates on improving mental health services for soldiers and working with Congress to boost funding, a magazine published by the American Psychological Association reported in September.

The stigma of seeking help for mental illness and emotional problems persists in the military, and erasing it from military culture will take some time.

"There are many people who have difficulty getting access, who have issues with stigma that prevent them from seeking psychological help," Navy Surgeon General Vice Adm. Donald Arthur told lawmakers in August. "I think the thrust of our activities should be aimed immediately at the identification and treatment of those who are encountering psychological stress and are significantly affected by it."

Treatment of Iraq/Afghanistan war vets has been under a microscope since the Walter Reed scandal broke last year. It seems clear that mental health ailments such as PTSD are inevitable for some on the battlefield. Relaxed recruiting standards will probably also boost reports of suicides, violent crimes and mental illness as the war drags on.

Posted at 6:43 PM
Posted to: Bush Administration, Congress, David Petraeus, Iraq, Middle East, Military, Robert Gates
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