CNMI Office of Veterans Affairs executive officer Stanley T. Iakopo on Wednesday said he wants to see expanded healthcare for local veterans and their families.
“My goal is to foster and strengthen a healthy relationship with the U.S. Department of Veterans Affairs and emphasize the need for veterans and their families to receive medical care throughout the CNMI especially on Tinian and Rota,” he said.
Iakopo noted that the Commonwealth Healthcare Corp. is the CNMI’s only fully functional hospital with medical health centers on Rota and Tinian.
He said although there is a VA contracted outreach clinic on Saipan, veterans on Rota and Tinian must fly to Saipan at their own expense, resulting in financial hardships.
“Providing veterans on Rota and Tinian healthcare services are long overdue,” he added. Through the Department of Veterans Affairs, we need to actively provide adequate medical care for veterans through a Veterans Affairs and U.S. Department of Defense sharing agreement, or through non-VA care providers in the community. I want to facilitate a much more vigorous and mutually beneficial partnership between the Department of Veterans Affairs and CHCC clinics throughout the CNMI,” Iakopo said.
In early May, he added, he brought up these concerns in a meeting with the VA Pacific Islands Healthcare System director Dr. Adam M. Robinson Jr.
“We no longer want to be treated as second-class citizens. Our veterans are dissatisfied with the unfulfilled and unsatisfactory services. Some of us in this lifetime may not see any Community-based Outpatient Clinic in the CNMI, which is why we need the VA to build a partnership with CHCC,” Iakopo said.
Stanley T. Iakopo
