§1173 Formal evaluation of recommendations

Summary

The Secretary must create a process to do a formal review for every recommendation from the Working Group. Each review must look at scientific studies (human, animal, lab, and methods), claims data (how often claims are filed and granted and how common service connection is), and other relevant things like how serious or deadly the health effect is, how much and how good the information is, how long it would take to get more evidence, whether the condition is linked to combat or deployment, how common the condition is, and when the condition usually appears. Each review must follow rules of scientific honesty and not hide or twist results. The review must judge how likely a positive link is between a toxic exposure while serving and an illness. It must sort the evidence into four levels: strong enough to say a link exists; enough to say a link is at least as likely as not but not strong enough to prove it; too weak to say either way; or evidence that argues against a link. Within 120 days after a review starts, the part of the Department doing the review must send the Secretary a recommendation on whether to create or change a presumption that the illness was caused by service.