Veterans Are Not Immune to Health Disparities

“Different groups of Veterans face unique barriers to doing the things they need to do: taking their medicines, taking the right medicines, complying with diet and exercise. We think it’s a matter of taking what we know we can do well, because we’re doing it for some Veterans, and making sure that all Veterans can gain those benefits – making sure that it resonates with all of our veterans that they can do the things that they need to do to stay healthy.” - Dr. Ernest Moy, Executive Director of the Office of Health Equity, Veterans Health Administration

It’s my pleasure to introduce another entry in our quarterly vlog series, where we engage with partners in the public and private sectors to discuss the ways in which we can collaborate to advance our collective mission to promote greater health equity and well-being for all people.

As part of our November observance of Veterans Day,  I joined Dr. Ernest Moy, Executive Director of the Office of Health Equity at the Veterans Health Administration, to discuss the unique health challenges and disparities that our Veterans population faces, and what is being done to address them.

To learn more about the Veterans Health Administration and its priorities, visit VA.gov/health. To learn more about the VHA’s Office of Health Equity, please visit VA.gov/HEALTHEQUITY. 

For more on how the VA is screening veterans for social needs and providing clinical teams with real-time information to help address those needs, I encourage you to check out the Assessing Circumstances & Offering Resources for Needs (ACORN) Initiative. 

To learn more about ODPHP’s initiatives and our work to improve public health, please visit odphp.health.gov.