Sexually traumatized female vets will get VA help

The Department of Veterans Affairs is opening a treatment center exclusively for traumatized female veterans amid an unprecedented wave of reported rapes, assaults and harassment against women.

Last update: November 1, 2007 - 8:08 PM

The Department of Veterans Affairs is opening a treatment center exclusively for traumatized female veterans amid an unprecedented wave of reported rapes, assaults and harassment against women.

The facility, to be opened in late December in Bernards Township, N.J., will be the only residential program in the VA system devoted solely to treating women who experienced military sexual trauma.

Although the VA has a network of 15 sexual trauma programs, those programs differ from the new one because they either accept both sexes or care for women who also have mental health issues not related to sexual assault.

A VA screening process mandated by Congress in 2002 has found that 20 percent of women and 1 percent of men leaving the military say they suffered some form of sexual trauma, including assault and serious harassment.

And in recent years, the reported number of sexually assaulted women in the military has skyrocketed. Military sexual assaults jumped from 1,700 in 2004 to 2,947 in 2006. The Pentagon attributes the increase to a new reporting system that encourages women to come forward by giving them the option not to pursue formal charges against their assailant.

NEWHOUSE NEWS SERVICE