US government takes steps to expand health care to veterans in the Pacific

After decades of neglect, the U.S. government is one step closer to removing long-standing barriers to free health care for veterans from three Pacific islands.

Hundreds of such veterans, who served as foreign citizens in the U.S. military, are legally entitled to the care, but current federal law prohibits the Department of Veterans Affairs from providing it directly to them where they live or compensating them for the cost of flights to the United States for it.

This month, Secretary of State Antony J. Blinken and Secretary of the Interior Deb Haaland asked congressional leaders to pass legislation that would allow the Department to do either of these things.

Joseph Yun, President Biden’s special envoy to the three Micronesian nations – the Federated States of Micronesia, the Marshall Islands and Palau – said in an interview that coverage by The New York Times “influenced” the decision to make changes to the barriers concerns to pursue.

The three Micronesian countries are independent but maintain close relations with the United States under agreements known as compacts of free association. The compacts give the United States control over the security of the Micronesian lands and, among other things, enable its citizens to enlist in the United States military.

Mr. Yun has spent the past year negotiating updates to the agreements as the United States solidifies its relations in the Pacific against Chinese influence. The changes for veterans are part of a package of compact-related proposals.

Kalani Kaneko, a veteran and Marshallese former health minister, said he was “hopeful and optimistic” about the news. But then he hit a more frustrated note. “I also imagine our veterans who took their own lives because they didn’t get the help they needed,” he said. “And I wish they were still around to see the progress.”