The Inspector General report that 307,000 U.S. veterans died while waiting on Veteran's Affairs benefits generated considerable shock and outrage among every member of MSNBC's Morning Joe panel Friday.
The Free Beacon reports:
More than 307,000 of the pending records in the Department of Veterans’ Affairs health care enrollment system belong to individuals who have already died, a VA Office of Inspector General report finds.
The pending records belonging to dead individuals in the VA system represent 35 percent of the backlog of 867,000 records labeled pending as of Sept. 30, 2014.
Released Wednesday, the IG report comes less than two months after a leaked internal VA document indicated that 238,657 of the 847,882 veterans waiting to be enrolled in VA health care, or 28 percent, had already died.
"What this figure means is that 307,000 of our fighting men and women died waiting to get into the VA system," co-host Mika Brzezinski said. "They didn't die waiting for an appointment. They died waiting for eligibility to schedule an appointment."
MSNBC displayed a graphic showing the 307,000 figure represented more than triple the amount of U.S. combat fatalities in Iraq, Afghanistan, Vietnam and Korea.
"Staggering, breathtaking numbers," host Joe Scarborough said. "This system is not only an embarrassment, it's costing the lives of our vets."
Brzezinski muttered it was an "insult."
"We're not even doing them the courtesy when they return of giving them an appointment," panelist Katty Kay said.
The scandal of long waiting lists, overstuffed backlogs and widespread agency misconduct at the VA first came to light in the spring of 2014, and then-VA Secretary Eric Shinseki wound up resigning amid a nationwide uproar.
"It's unimaginable," Washington Post columnist Eugene Robinson said. "How can this have happened? Why do you have a VA system if you're not going to let people into it? It makes no sense, and, I mean, we need more than reform here. This is almost a start-over kind of situation."