Page 38 - Va S News Today : Breaking News, Live Updates & Top Stories | Vimarsana

It implemented safeguards from this ever happening again. new this morning, we have our hands on what appears to be an unthe earnal memo that deals with the va's practices when dealing with our sick or injured veterans. to the story is still developing and we will have the latest coming up next hour. a deadly attack today on a u.s. aid agency come bound in afghanistan. at least four people killed, 20 others wounded in the predawn attack by taliban militants in kunduz. a suicide bomber on foot and another in a car stormed the facility and firing machine guns and hurling grenades. latest att...

The head of the va about the situation. what's going on, steve? >> well, the -- secretary of the department of veterans affairs has stated he is going to change the culture in the va and i believe that he really does want to change the culture of the va. but those words alone have not filtered down throughout the entire system. the va is a huge system. has a lot of people involved in it. and e especially with the healt administration the cull taur change hasn't occurred. besides just saying we need to make a lot of change, they need to make sure there is more oversight, more accountability if ...

Quickly. >> here's what -- i mean, obviously, we all have a lot of frustration with the va, and we have been covering these stories time be time again on how our veterans are getting such poor care and we're reveals stories like this. listening to the representative from the hospital saying sometimes policies just aren't followed, that's unacceptable. >> that's just so unaccept am, and, again, we have to have higher standards than that at the va. our veterans deserve it, and it also had a chilling effect on health care for all veterans. when they hear these kinds of stories, people tend to won...

Do. what are you demanding? what are you asking for? what kind of pressure is on the va? how do we know a vet coming in the hospital today is going to get good care? >> first and foremost, we have to evaluate these almost 2,000 veterans that were exposed. they say the risk is low, but the consequences is dire. we have to evaluate those almost 2,000 veterans promptly to get to the bottom of this instance and then we have to get to the bottom of the question of how we maintain the standards, not just in st. louis but across the country. there's been too many stories like this. we have to focus o...

I mean, where is the accountability? i mean the va has got to be doing more auditing to find these mistakes and have to make changes immediately. do they need to clean house? i mean, where are the firings? where are the changes that are being made? we have been talking about these mistake for a number of years now. >> i agree with you 100%. i mean, in no other cabinet level agency should it be allowed for someone in a position to serve to no follow the rules and regulations and not be held accountable when they are found out to have been -- have been violated rules and regulations. we need acc...