Last week, The U.S. House of Representatives unanimously approved the Veterans Access to Care Act.  This is a major step forward following a bipartisan bill that was passed in the Senate which nearly triples veterans healthcare spending over the next three years.  The bill adds additional doctors and allows veterans to seek care in the private marketplace.

The United States is on a winning streak, the bad kind of winning streak.  A study done by the well respected Commonwealth Fund concluded that the quality of the U.S. health-care system when compared with 10 other western, industrialized nations which included the United Kingdom, Canada, Switzerland, Germany, and Australia was the least effective in terms of quality of care and the most effective in terms of cost.

The United States Senate has passed a bill that could double the amount of money spent on veterans healthcare. An analysis done by the Committee for a Responsible Federal Budget suggests that without setting budgetary caps on private care reimbursement rates that Veterans Affairs healthcare spending could increase by over $500 Billion over the next ten years.