Army lifts ban on cutters, mentally ill and drug abusers to meet recruiting goals

.....one word.... "Eeeeesh...!!!"
...one sentence... "Do we REALLY need this in the US ARMY?"
...one question... "Would you be confortable being their Battle Buddy in a Firefight?"

Med Waivers were an issue to begin with, not only in the processing time, but the preparation and submittal of all the documentation.
In my case, back in 1991, my personal concerns were over ridden by the Stations needs and a Med Waiver was processed on an individual that I did not "want in My Army". I had my reasons, again not related to the Med Waiver itself, but related to the mental condition of the applicant.

That individual was put into boots, and went on to do some pretty bad things three years later, and was eventually locked away in Leavenworth one year after that. The Med Waiver was not related to his problem directly, but I felt that the situation was enough not to continue processing him. My "Recruiting Battle Buddy" (we had to share resources back in 1990-1991...two Recruiters to a "G-Car") was directed to process him and since we both worked together we did as we were directed.

The US Military is not where we send people to "get fixed"...
If they need fixing, the Minute Clinic is right down the road and the funny farm is at the next intersection... if those two cannot fix them then we TRULY don't need them.

We owe it to our fellow soldiers of all ranks to make sure that what we put into the Army to become their battle buddy is someone we have no issue sharing a foxhole and enemy fire with.

A lot of parents don't want to deal with their kids. So they shrink and medicate them, instead of -talking-. So you have wild rates of ADD, ADHD, depression, anxiety, bipolar, etc being diagnosed...for issues -any- high school kid would have.

Seems ridiculous that those should bar you from service years later, when it was barely a problem to begin with. Yet, that was the state of medical standards.

I guarantee that the majority of people won't bother to read the article, where it states -clearly- that the process is adversarial. It is on the applicant to clearly prove that their medical history should not bar them, and vetted by many levels of doctors.

I'm not a doctor, you're not a doctor, I doubt anyone here is. So who are we to judge? Send it for review, to medical professionals, who know what they're talking about. No matter how much "experience" we have, none of us are qualified to make any kind of judgement. Recruiters are always criticized for only worrying about numbers and bodies. Black and white. We finally get some guidance that allows us to treat applicants as -people-, that lets us see beyond buzzwords...

Time will tell. But I'm optimistic.

I am am not a fan. I understand the reasoning numbers that is all well and good the issues that will be painful for the leaders to deal with are what I see as the downfall. We are going to ignore mental issues and send these young people to combat arms?