On August 1, 2024, the Department of Veterans Affairs (VA) announced it was going to revamp the existing Airborne Hazards and Open Burn Pit Registry to include over 4.7 million veterans, who served in various locations and were subject to potentially dangerous air quality.

The existing Registry was created in 2014 by the VA because Congress required the VA to establish a registry to monitor the health of veterans with potential exposure to airborne hazards and open burn pits.

Approximately 500,000 veterans were enrolled in the 2014 Registry. According to the VA, the 2014 database will remain intact but will be completely separate from the new 2024 version of the Registry.

The VA initially opposed creating the 2014 Registry because, according to the VA, there was no proven connection between open burn pits and veterans’ illnesses.

The National Academies of Science, Engineering, and Medicine, in 2022, determined that the 2014 Registry was “not helpful” and suggested that the financial resources expended on the database should be used for an improved patient surveillance system and research platform.

Now, the VA officials believe that the newly created 2024 Registry will become an important research tool that will enable the VA to identify and study the health challenges of the veteran and service member population.

To formulate the new Registry, the Department of Defense (DoD) and the VA researched deployment data for veterans who served in certain locations during specific time periods when they may have been exposed to toxic conditions, such as oil fires, chemical plumes, burn pits, nerve agents and other hazardous materials.

The new Registry will include military personnel information, demographics (such as gender, race, and ethnicity), and deployment locations. It will not include medical information or any data related to filing for VA benefits.

The new Registry version will now include veterans who served in the following campaigns: Desert Shield; Desert Storm; Operation Iraqi Freedom; Operation Enduring Freedom; and Operation New Dawn.

Also new Registry will include veterans from the following countries, during the time periods of August 2, 1990, to August 31, 2021: Afghanistan; Arabian Sea; Bahrain; Djibouti; Egypt; Gulf of Aden; Gulf of Oman; Iraq; Kuwait; Oman; Qatar; Red Sea; Saudi Arabia; Syria; United Arab Emirates; Uzbekistan and the waters of the Persian Gulf.

Lastly, the Registry will include veterans who served in Somalia (since August 2, 1990); the Southwest Asia Theater of military operations and Egypt (since August 2, 1990); and Afghanistan; Djibouti; Jordan; Lebanon; Syria; Uzbekistan; or Yemen (any time after September 11, 2001).

According to the VA’s Under Secretary for Health Dr. Shereef Elnahal, if VA researchers want to use the new Registry’s database to understand health consequences and also need the information to be linked to clinical data, they will have to submit their studies for review.

If the research extends beyond population-level analysis and requires disclosure of veterans’ identities, the veterans will be asked for consent.

My Opinion: The primary problem I had with the existing 2014 Registry version was that it had no direct connection with the Veterans Benefits Administration (VBA) or the physical healthcare component of the Veterans Health Administration (VHA).

The 2014 Registry version existed as a method for the VHA to collect research on veterans who were exposed to toxic airborne hazards. It had no direct connection to the VBA for filing disability compensation claims.

If a veteran met the qualifications to be placed in the 2014 Registry, no information was then forwarded to the health care services component of the VHA.

Many times, disabled veterans who qualified to be placed in the 2014 Registry assumed that they would be contacted by the VHA to establish medical appointments or be contacted by the VBA to file a disability claim.

These veterans did nothing else and waited. There was no other follow-up conducted by the collectors of the Registry research data to see what qualified veterans were pursuing from being exposed to toxic substances.

Also, the 2014 Registry had no component for updating data by veterans of their health conditions. In effect, there was no tracking of veterans’ health conditions as their illnesses progressed

Perhaps this assumption was based on the successful Million Veterans Program (MVP). The MVP collected data from a donated blood sample and would only contact the veteran when a research study was to be conducted. For example, I have never been contacted after I donated my blood sample in 2015 at the Cincinnati VAMC.

I believe that the 4.7 million veterans, now included in the new Registry, should participate in the Registry, even though the new Registry will have no impact on the veterans’ health care or their disability benefits.

History has demonstrated that veterans have traditionally participated in VA research, such as the Million Veterans Program (MVP), because they know that participation will help other veterans in the future.

The inclusion of these additional 4.7 million veterans will greatly expand the Registry and pave the way for future clinical research. Veterans should participate, not for themselves, but for the health of veterans in the future!

BioSketch: John Plahovinsak is a retired 32-year Army veteran who served from 1967 to 1999. He is the Disabled American Veterans (DAV) Department of Ohio Hospital Chairman and Adjutant of Chapter #63 (Clermont County). He has also participated in the 2014 Airborne Hazards and Open Burn Pits Registry and the Million Veterans Program (MVP). He can be contacted at: plahovinsak@msn.com.