Like many global war on terror veterans, I have personal experience with post-traumatic stress. Having joined the Marine Corps right out of high school, I served six years, including a 2011 deployment to Afghanistan’s Helmand Province. At the Bastion Trauma Center, I saw more battlefield damage than I care to remember.
When I got home, I took a post-deployment health assessment that indicated a need to seek treatment for PTS. I went through talk therapy. It didn’t help. Then came the prescription medications — the same medications that have been used for decades — and they only exacerbated my symptoms. One night, I was less than a pound of trigger pull from becoming a suicide statistic. If another Marine hadn’t stepped in, I wouldn’t be here.
That experience showed me that the system meant to help us wasn’t working for everyone — and was slow to experiment with new solutions.
I eventually found solace in a service dog named Kaya. The Department of Veterans Affairs didn’t cover it, and nonprofits had long wait times. So I spent $10,000 of my own money to purchase and train her. It was worth every penny. My personal success with Kaya led me to advocate for the PAWS Act, which expanded access to service dogs for veterans with PTS.
But my story is just one example. PTS treatment looks different for every veteran, and every veteran deserves access to the treatment that works for him or her.
Recently, the Food and Drug Administration fast-tracked nine life-saving drugs as part of the agency’s Commissioner’s National Priority Voucher program, designed to speed up treatments that address urgent national health priorities. Review times that once took nearly a year can now drop to as little as one to two months.
That’s good news for cancer patients, rare-disease families, and other Americans with critical needs. But veterans with mental health challenges, which could lead to suicidal ideation, deserve the same urgency. Every day we don’t act, we lose more veterans to this crisis.
A Yale-led study found that 14% of younger U.S. veterans (ages 22-49) meet the criteria for probable PTS, nearly triple the rate of older veterans. Among Iraq and Afghanistan veterans, 14-16% deal with PTS or depression. Yet fewer than half who need mental health treatment receive it, and only one-third get evidence-based care.
Meanwhile, the FDA has approved just two drugs for PTS treatment since the 1990s: Zoloft and Paxil. Both are decades old and often ineffective for combat-related trauma because they treat symptoms, not underlying causes. Research shows that about 80% of PTS patients who use VA-prescribed medications for PTS continue to need new or better treatments.
That’s why it’s time to act. The FDA has already shown it can move fast when a disease is seen as urgent. PTS should be treated the same way. The FDA should use its fast-track authority to prioritize safe, innovative treatments that can achieve true remission. It should work directly with the VA to ensure studies reflect culturally appropriate military trauma, not just civilian cases.
Once new therapies are proven effective, the government should move to ensure rapid rollout and access — not years of bureaucratic delay.
Veterans don’t need more committees or press releases. We need results. If Washington can move mountains to get other drugs to market in record time, it can do the same for the men and women who fought for our country.
VETERANS DEFENDED OUR HOMELAND AND NOW THEY NEED A PLACE IN IT
Every day, 17 veterans die by suicide. Many of them were caught in the same cycle I was: struggling to find help, drowning in red tape, and running out of hope.
It’s time for our government to move with the same urgency our military shows on the battlefield. Today, the FDA can support America’s heroes and save lives by fast-tracking PTS treatments.
Cole Lyle is a veteran advocate, former policy adviser in the U.S. Senate and U.S. Department of Veterans Affairs, and a U.S. Marine Corps combat veteran.
