WASHINGTON -- Families of Marines stationed at Camp Lejeune three decades ago might receive a sliver of military-sponsored health care to address diseases caused by drinking and bathing in toxic water.
Legislation passed by a key Senate committee Thursday would require the Department of Defense to offer health care to spouses, children and other family members who were exposed to contaminated water at the base in the 1970s and '80s.
U.S. Sen. Richard Burr, a Winston-Salem Republican, opposed the bill. He said it takes the wrong approach and will give false hope to thousands of struggling families.
Burr and U.S. Sen. Kay Hagan, a Greensboro Democrat, have sponsored a competing bill that makes the Veterans Affairs department responsible for health care. They say the VA would do a better job.
Thousands of Marines and their family members living at Camp Lejeune were exposed to tap water contaminated with trichloroethylene, tetrachloroethylene dichloroethylene benzene and vinyl chloride.
Military veterans already are entitled to health care through the VA system. At issue is where family members also might receive care.
Burr and Hagan's bill was offered Thursday as an amendment but failed along partisan lines in the Senate Veterans Affairs Committee, with Democrats on the committee unanimously opposed. Burr is the committee's top Republican. Hagan does not sit on the committee.
Instead, the committee approved legislation that would require Tricare, the military's health care program, to treat diseases directly linked to the exposure.
It's unclear how much that would cost and how the military would decide which ailments to cover. Studies have yet to provide direct links between the toxins and a variety of cancers and other ailments among Camp Lejeune's former inhabitants.
Burr and Hagan say the Department of Defense can't be trusted to take care of Marines and family members after the department has spent decades denying a connection between the water and the illnesses.
"I can't in good conscience agree to give these brave men and women a false hope that they'll get health care," Burr said. "Do you really believe the Department of Defense will accept responsibility for this health care when it still doesn't accept responsibility for the contamination?"
Burr noted that the U.S. Department of Navy has been ordered by Congress to pay for a scientific study on the potential link between exposure and disease, but that hasn't happened.
"There will not be a Navy nominee considered on the Senate floor until this is resolved," Burr said.
Veterans Affairs Secretary Eric Shinseki warned that the Burr-Hagan bill could apply to half a million military dependents and cost the VA $4.16billion over 10 years.
Committee Chairman DanielAkaka of Hawaii, who sponsored Thursday's legislation, said he agreed with Burr that families exposed to contaminated water should receive health care from the federal government.
But he and other Democrats on the committee argue that Defense must be held responsible for problems it created.
Burr said he will tie his and Hagan's amendment to other bills moving through the Senate - "to everything appropriate and inappropriate" - until he can get President Barack Obama to sign his proposal into law.
