U.S. secures vast new trove of intelligence on ISIS

The New York Times is reporting that the United States is poring over a vast trove of new intelligence about Islamic State fighters who have flowed into Syria andIraq and some who then returned to their home countries, information that American officials say could help fight militants on the battlefield and prevent potential plotters from slipping into Europe.

American-backed Syrian Kurdish and Arab militias have seized more than 10,000 documents and 4.5 terabytes of digital data in recent weeks while fighting insurgents in Manbij in northern Syria, near the Turkish border, a major hub for Islamic State fighters entering and leaving Syria, American officials said.

An initial American review of the material offers new clues about “foreign fighters, the networks, where they’re from,” according to Brett McGurk, President Obama’s special envoy for combating the Islamic State. Other officials said the information included the fighters’ identities, countries of origin, routes into Syria and the illicit networks that recruited and ferried them to the region. Those details are being shared with allies to help stanch the flow of militants.

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Battlefield success against ISIS may produce more terrorism for the West, FBI Director James Comey warned this week, according to CNN.

Speaking to a cybersecurity conference at Fordham University Wednesday, Comey predicted that eventually crushing ISIS in its self-proclaimed caliphate in Syria and Iraq will likely result in dispersing terrorists elsewhere, CNN reported.

“At some point there is going to be a terrorist diaspora out of Syria like we've never seen before,” Comey said. “Not all of the Islamic State killers are going to die on the battlefield.”

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Older military veterans frequently show improvements in pain intensity over time. However, opioids, some mental health conditions and certain pain diagnoses are associated with lower likelihood of improvement, according to research reported in The Journal of Pain, as reported by Science Daily.

The aging veteran population is at especially high risk for persistent pain. Unfortunately, little is known about factors linked with positive and negative outcomes over time. Further, older adults have the highest prevalence of long-term use of pain medications, including opioids.

Researchers at the Department of Veterans Affairs Center to Improve Veterans Involvement in Care and Oregon Health & Science University sought to identify clinical and demographic factors associated with changes in pain scores over time in a national cohort of veterans 65 and older with chronic pain. They hypothesized that older age and comorbid mental health disorders would be associated with less improvement in pain conditions over time.

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Fearing the Department of Veterans Affairs would deny his claim, a disabled Gulf War veteran avoided going to his nearest emergency department during a recent medical scare, according to a recent stoary from NewsChannel 7/WSAW-TV in Wausau, Wi.

“My pillow was covered in blood,” said Jerry Zehrung, who has lived with a constant infection risk since having his hip resurfaced eight years ago.

“My wife looks at me and she's panicked,” Zehrung said. “Her first instinct was let’s get you to the emergency room. And my first instinct was who's going to pay the bill.”

Testifying before a Veterans’ Affairs subcommittee in February, VA Assistant Deputy Undersecretary for Health for Community Care, Dr. Baligh Yahia, told members of congress during the 2014 budget year approximately 30 percent of the 2.9 million emergency claims filed with the VA were denied.

Of those 870,000 denied claims, a VA representative confirmed to NewsChannel 7 Investigates 7,000 of those claims came from Wisconsin veterans.

In breaking down the denied claims during his testimony, Yahia said 89,000 were late. Another 98,000 were not emergencies. 140,000 were denied because a VA facility was determined to have been available. And 320,000 more claims were denied because the Veteran was determined to have other health insurance that should have paid for the care.

This story was originally published July 29, 2016 at 12:13 PM with the headline "U.S. secures vast new trove of intelligence on ISIS."