Research shows that serving abroad in places like the Middle East and Southwest Asia exposes servicemen and servicewomen to a variety of infectious diseases, such as malaria, hepatitis, and even HIV.
If you are a veteran that contracted an infectious disease during your time in service, and it is affecting your health, the VA should know about it to give you a disability rating. For some infectious diseases, you may have to prove a connection between contraction and your time in service. For others, the VA will automatically accept a connection.
In this article about VA disability for infectious diseases:
- How to Apply for Infectious Disease Disability
- Do VA Benefits Apply to Infectious Diseases?
- How VA Ratings for Infectious Diseases Work
- How VA Ratings Are Assigned
- VA Ratings for Malaria
- VA Ratings for STDs
- VA Rating for HIV
- Note on Secondary Infections
- How VA Ratings for Infectious Diseases Will Affect Your Overall Disability Rating
- What to Do If Your Rating Is Not Accurate
- Do You Need Help Getting a Fair Rating?
How to Apply for Infectious Disease Disability
You will need to undergo a C&P examination, after which you can be assigned a VA rating. This will determine your rate of compensation. VA ratings for malaria, tuberculosis, HIV, hepatitis and other infectious diseases depend on the severity of symptoms you are experiencing and how these are impacting your ability to function.
Before you begin the process of gaining compensation, you must inform yourself about the VA rating procedure. In some instances, VA ratings can be incorrect, in which case you will need to know how to go about contesting these.
Here one of our VA disability lawyers talks about the VA appeals process.
Do VA Benefits Apply to Infectious Diseases?
Yes. The VA recognizes the risk of infectious diseases that servicemen and servicewomen face when deployed.
Infections can result from numerous sources, including drinking water, ablutions water, contaminated food, and contact with local populations. In many cases, wounded military service personnel also contract infections within treatment facilities. According to a study published in 2018, 38% of hospitalized service members contracted a trauma-related infection after their initial hospital discharge.
Your disability claim might also be strong because of where you served. The VA has a list of presumptive diseases based on various locations and specific times. These are assumed to be service-related due to the high likelihood of contraction because of what was going on at the wrong place and the wrong time.
For example, if you contracted certain infections and served in the Gulf, you do not have to prove a service connection. The presumptive diseases list for the Persian Gulf Theater includes:
- Malaria
- West Nile virus
- Brucellosis
- Q fever
- Food poisoning
- Tuberculosis
- Salmonella
- Black fever
- Shigella
If you have contracted a presumptive disease, then the VA will not require a medical nexus. If you have contracted an infectious disease that is not presumptive, then you will be required to provide a nexus to the VA. To do so, you will need to find a medical professional who can ascertain whether service-related activities and environments caused your infection. Medical nexuses are done by independent, qualified medical professionals and act to prove a connection between your condition and your time in service.
One of the lawyers on our VA Disability Team talks about how important a Nexus Letter is.
While the VA recognizes that veterans are likely to have contracted contagious diseases while abroad, the level of compensation that you will receive depends on your present symptoms.
The way the VA determines this is through its rating system. Let’s take a look.
How VA Ratings for Infectious Diseases Work
The VA rates infectious diseases and their symptoms on a scale of 0% to 100%.
A 0% rating indicates that a person is cleared of any symptoms, is fully functioning, and, therefore, will not receive compensation. A rating of 100%, on the other hand, is the highest level of disability and gets the highest compensation.
To be given a disability 100% rating from the VA, a veteran must be experiencing the most severe symptoms and likely not able to carry out typical day-to-day functions such as attending work or caring for themselves.
Here is how to get the most out of your C&P Exam.
How VA Ratings Are Assigned
To be assigned a VA disability rating for a condition, you will need to undergo a Compensation and Pension (C&P) exam. During the examination, a VA doctor will evaluate the severity of your symptoms and the resulting disability. The doctor won’t try to treat you as a result of this exam. This is only to diagnose and rate your condition. He or she may refer you to another doctor at another time for treatment.
As mentioned above, if you have contracted an infection that is on the presumptive disease list for your service area, you can automatically undergo the C&P exam. If the infection is not a presumptive disease for the region where you served, then you will have to provide a medical nexus before the VA will schedule a C&P exam.
For infectious diseases, the VA mandates that a rating of 100% must be given to veterans that are experiencing an active infection. During this time, you will likely not be able to care for yourself or work. Therefore, total disability is awarded.
After the active infection stage has passed (which is generally in a few weeks or under six months), the VA is required to do a re-assessment and award you a 0% rating. However, many infectious diseases cause long-term symptoms and relapses.
For example, after contracting malaria, patients can experience renewed bouts of the disease months or even several years after the initial infection. Other infectious diseases such as hepatitis can cause permanent damage to the liver.
Severe cases of Hepatitis C can also lead to the onset of diabetes, as well as liver cancer, hyperthyroidism, or hypothyroidism.
If you are experiencing lasting symptoms or mal-effects of an infectious disease, these will need to be assessed by the VA. After the assessment, you can then be assigned a rating for the permanent or ongoing disability that you are facing. You’ll be rated for that disability instead of the infectious disease.
To get an idea of how the rating system works for specific infectious diseases, let’s take a look at the VA rating for malaria as well as for STDs.
VA Ratings for Malaria
In 2017, a total of 87 countries reported indigenous malaria cases. Africa accounts for the highest concentration of the disease, with 92% of worldwide malaria cases.
Those serving in the armed forces who are deployed overseas are at high risk if they are stationed in a malaria area.
Malaria is a debilitating illness that can produce fever, vomiting, diarrhea, nausea, bloody stools, coma, and convulsions during its active stage. The long term effects can include relapses. In severe instances, malaria can progress to cerebral malaria, which can cause swelling of the brain and, ultimately, brain damage.
VA ratings for malaria differ depending on which stage of the illness you are in. If you are undergoing assessment during the active stage of malaria infection, you will likely be given a 100% disability rating for the duration of the infection.
Once the active infection has passed, you will be assigned as 0% rating, as mentioned above. However, should you experience relapses or neurological effects from cerebral malaria, you should then apply for a re-assessment with the VA. Even with a 0% rating you may be able to get a monthly check for SMC.
The VA deems that residual effects of malaria can include, but are not limited to, liver or splenic damage, and central nervous system conditions.
During re-assessment, the VA doctor will determine what symptoms you are experiencing on an ongoing basis, and what level of disability this causes. From this, you will be assigned a rating that will determine compensation.
One of our VA disability lawyers talks about how SMC works with VA disability benefits.
VA Ratings for STDs
STDs are another common and broad category of infectious diseases that the VA provides compensation for.
Reports state the STD transmission is high among those in service. The cause of this, like malaria, is often region-related.
However, unlike infectious diseases such as malaria, STDs are not on the VA’s list of presumptive diseases. This means there is no automatic connection between your contraction of the infection and service.
Therefore, to be able to get a VA rating for HIV, or VA ratings for STDs other than HIV, you will need to provide a medical nexus from an independent doctor. If the VA finds the nexus satisfactory, they will schedule a Compensation and Pension (C&P) exam.
During this, a VA doctor will determine what level of disability you are suffering from the infection and assign you a rating. In most cases, VA ratings for STDs will not be high, unless the STD is impacting your health significantly.
However, consideration is given to how it impacts your day-to-day living. For example, if your sexual relationship is impaired due to fear of infection, this may gain you a VA rating of 10% disability.
Use our VA disability calculator to estimate your
combined VA rating and monthly payment
One STD that the VA may assign a high rating to is HIV. Let’s take a more detailed look at how the VA rating for AIDS and HIV works.
VA Rating for HIV
The VA has a specific set of guidelines that VA doctors follow to assign disability ratings. In the case of HIV, the ratings in relation to disability levels detected are as follows.
0% VA Disability Rating
If, after your initial HIV infection diagnosis, you are asymptomatic, the VA decrees that you should be assigned a 0% disability rating, whether or not you have lymphadenopathy or a decreased T4 cell count.
10% VA Disability Rating
If the infection has progressed to the stage that you have developed HIV-related constitutional symptoms, you may be assigned a 10% disability rating. For this, your T4 cell count needs to be between 200 and 500; you must be taking the approved medication, or demonstrate depression or memory loss along with employment limitations.
30% VA Disability Rating
To be assigned a 30% disability rating, veterans need to display recurrent constitutional symptoms, as well as intermittent diarrhea, and use of prescribed medications or an AIDS-related T4 cell count of less than 200.
60% VA Disability Rating
If you are experiencing symptoms such as diarrhea and pathological infections that do not respond to treatment, the VA might assign you a 60% disability rating. If an AIDS-related opportunistic infection or neoplasm has developed, this may also be grounds for a 60% disability rating from the VA.
100% VA Disability Rating
If the HIV infection has progressed to AIDS, and you are experiencing recurrent opportunistic infections or secondary diseases that are impairing multiple body systems, you may be assigned a 100% VA rating for AIDS.
This level of infection is characterized by HIV-related illnesses along with debility and progressive loss of body weight.
Note on Secondary Infections
If you were wondering what infections qualify as opportunistic, the following are AIDS-defining conditions:
- Pneumonia
- Tuberculosis
- Invasive cervical cancer
- Salmonella septicemia
- Coccidioidomycosis
- Candidiasis of the bronchi, trachea, esophagus, or lungs
- Toxoplasmosis of the brain
- Wasting syndrome due to HIV
- Progressive multifocal leukoencephalopathy
- Histoplasmosis
- Chronic herpes ulcers lasting more than one month
For a full list of AIDS-defining conditions, visit this page on the VA site.
If you have been diagnosed with one or more opportunistic AIDS-defining conditions (in conjunction with HIV), the VA will automatically reach an AIDS diagnosis (and likely a higher rating) irrespective of your CD4 count.
How VA Ratings for Infectious Diseases Will Affect Your Overall Disability Rating
If you have other disability ratings, these will be added together with your VA ratings for malaria, HIV, or any other infectious disease for which you have been assigned a rating.
However, when combining ratings, the VA does not simply add them together. For example, if you had VA disability ratings of 30%, 20%, 10%, and 10% for various injuries and disabilities, your total VA disability rating would not be 70%. Instead, it would be 60% after rounding.
There are VA tables you can use to calculate your total VA disability rating. However, one of the easiest ways to add up your ratings is with our VA disability calculator. With the calculator, you can calculate your total rating and also estimate what level of compensation this will result in.
Here is a video explaining how the VA Combined Ratings Table works: aka VA Math.
What to Do If Your Rating Is Not Accurate
The VA’s system for evaluating disability is not foolproof. If you feel that the rating you received is incorrect or too low, you can contest this by applying for a VA higher-level review.
Another instance where your rating may not be accurate is if your symptoms have worsened. If you have been assigned a disability rating for a condition that worsens by the end of the year, you can lodge a claim for an increased disability rating using form 526EZ. (We help you fill it out and any other forms when you work with our team.)
The VA will usually schedule another C&P exam for you, where your condition will be re-evaluated.
The VA claims process can be long and arduous. Therefore it is often best to get a VA disability lawyer to help you through the process.
Do You Need Help Getting a Fair Rating?
Gaining fair compensation for your service-related disability is usually not easy. What’s more, the evaluation process that the VA uses is highly subjective.
If you are struggling to get fair VA ratings for malaria, HIV, or any other infectious disease contracted through service—call us.
We have helped vets from all over the US gain fair compensation from the VA, in less time. What’s more, we do not charge any upfront fees, and you only need to pay us if we win your case.
Reach out today to talk to us about your claim.