(CNN)The Department of Veterans Affairs has been forced to find alternative ways to ship mail-order prescriptions for patients whose medication is delivered by the United States Postal Service, including FedEx and UPS, CNN has learned.
The VA acknowledged the change in
an email to a veterans group called Disabled Vets of America after it raised
the issue on behalf of patients who had reported significant delays in
receiving medication from USPS in recent weeks amid a nationwide slowdown,
according to a copy of the correspondence reviewed by CNN.
"The VA has now confirmed to
us that the United States Postal Service (USPS), which is responsible for
delivering about 90% of all VA mail order prescriptions, has indeed been
delayed in delivering these critical medications by an average of almost 25%
over the past year, with many locations experiencing much more significant
delays," the group's national commander, Stephen Whitehead, said in a
statement Monday.
"To help mitigate these
postal delays, the VA has been forced to switch to alternative delivery
services in a number of areas across the country and is taking other actions to
expedite processing and delivery of prescriptions," Whitehead added.
Those areas include Detroit,
parts of New York and New Jersey, which were identified as hotspots with
delivery delays, according to the VA email to veterans group, which was
reviewed by CNN.
The VA "proactively
converted from USPS to United Parcel Service (UPS) 2nd day air for those areas
until service levels could be returned," the email says. The department
also identified a "delivery service issue with UPS in the Arizona area and
converted to Fed-Ex for roughly 5-weeks until service levels were restored with
UPS," it adds.
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