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President Obama is opposing suggestions to privatize the Department of Veterans Affairs to improve the health care that veterans receive. In an interview with The Colorado Springs Gazette, he said that his administration had made progress modernizing the department and providing veterans with more timely care. Privatizing the agency would delay that progress, Mr. Obama said. (6/5)

"The notion of dismantling the VA system would be a mistake," Obama told The Gazette on Thursday after he shook the hands of 812 new Air Force officers -- all of whom will someday be veterans. He said his administration has made steady progress in modernizing the VA and providing veterans with more timely health care. Reinventing the system would derail that progress. "If you look at, for example, VA health care, there have been challenges getting people into the system. Once they are in, they are extremely satisfied and the quality of care is very high," Obama said. (Schrader, 6/5)

The Department of Veterans Affairs is proposing a rule change to begin covering sex-reassignment surgeries and other related medical treatment for transgender veterans. ... “Surgical procedures are now widely accepted in the medical community as medically necessary treatment for gender dysphoria,” the medical diagnosis required for a transgender person to have sex-reassignment surgery, the proposed rule change said. “Recent medical research shows that gender dysphoria is a serious condition that has had severe medical consequences for certain patients if transition-related surgeries and procedures are not provided.” (Kesling and Radnofsky, 6/3)