Dental Care for Veterans Act
Dental Care for Veterans Act would treat dental care as a standard VA medical benefit, making the Secretary of Veterans Affairs responsible for furnishing dental services to veterans “in the same manner as any other medical service.” The bill reorganizes how dental benefits are delivered, allowing the VA to furnish dentures and dental appliances directly and to procure such items as needed. It also phases in eligibility for dental care over several years, starting with those already eligible under current law and expanding to additional groups described in the existing VA health care eligibility framework (38 U.S.C. 1705) over a four-year period. In short, the bill aims to normalize and expand VA dental coverage, bringing more veterans into a VA-provided dental care system rather than limiting benefits to a narrower subset. The changes involve broad statutory restructuring, including changes to cross-references and section headings, to reflect dental care as an integrated medical service. The bill would remove or reorganize certain existing provisions and renumber or rename sections to accommodate a unified approach to appliances, medicines, and related dental services. Funding specifics are not spelled out in the text, so costs would depend on future appropriations.
Key Points
- 1The Secretary of Veterans Affairs would furnish dental care the same way as other VA medical services, effectively making dental benefits part of standard VA health care.
- 2VA would have authority to furnish dentures and dental appliances directly and to procure such appliances for veterans.
- 3Eligibility for VA dental care would be phased in over time:
- 4- Veterans already eligible for VA dental services on enactment would begin receiving expanded dental benefits immediately.
- 5- Other veterans would become eligible in a staged schedule over the next up to four years, based on existing VA health care eligibility categories (as defined in 1705).
- 6The bill makes conforming amendments to cross-references, terminology, and table headings to reflect that dental care is an integrated medical service (e.g., renaming sections and adjusting how “appliances” and related items are described).
- 7It removes or reorganizes certain existing provisions (e.g., section 2062) and reclassifies related sections (e.g., labeling 1712 as dealing with “Appliances; drugs and medicines for certain disabled veterans; vaccines”) to align with the new structure.