November 11, 2019
The Forgotten Military Caregivers
by Anna Sutherland,
5.5 million American adults are serving as caregivers to veterans or members of the military. Tweet This
Military caregivers face even more challenges than civilian caregivers in fulfilling their responsibilities. Tweet This
Editor's Note: In honor of Veteran's Day, we are republishing an updated version of the following essay written by former IFS editor Anna Sutherland, who passed away earlier this year.
While the struggles of military veterans—poor access to health care as well as tragically high rates of suicide, unemployment, and homelessness—occasionally make the headlines, it's commonly been observed that most Americans give little thought to military members and veterans in day-to-day life. Seven in ten members of the general public and almost eight in ten veterans say civilians don't understand the problems military members face, and a shrinking percentage of Americans have a veteran or current member of the military in their immediate family.
If soldiers and veterans are largely invisible today, however, that story goes double for their family members and caregivers. When we hear the term "caregiver," we usually think of someone helping an aging parent or a disabled adult child. As RAND researchers Terri Tanielian and Rajeev Ramchand informed Congress in a May 2016 briefing, however, of the 22.6 million Americans acting as unpaid caregivers to other adults, 5.5 million (about 25%) are caring for a veteran or current member of the military.
https://ifstudies.org/blog/the-forgotten-military-caregivers
