Department of the Air Force recruiters will now offer waivers for future airmen and Space Force Guardians with certain diagnoses of asthma, hearing loss and food allergies, a major policy change that could open up service to more civilians.
The change, announced publicly this week, is expected to open up service to around 600 new applicants each year, the Department of the Air Force said in a news release.
"We are constantly evaluating how we can bring in the best talent while ensuring our members can serve effectively and safely," Brig. Gen. Christopher Amrhein, the commander of the Air Force Ascensions Center, said in the release. "By expanding waiver criteria for manageable health conditions, we can access a wider pool of qualified applicants without compromising mission readiness."
The new waivers come as the Air Force managed to scrape by its active-duty recruiting goals, in large part due to policy changes for recruits ranging from allowing higher percentages of body fat to permitting certain tattoo sizes.
Under the prior policy, all cases of asthma -- no matter the severity -- were disqualifying conditions for service, Col. David Gregory, director of the Accession Medical Waiver division at the Air Force Ascensions Center, said in the news release.
Now, applicants with diagnosed asthma can join. "provided they do not require daily preventive medication, and their rescue inhaler use is kept to a minimum," the service explained.
In addition to waivers for asthma, the service will now start waiving some circumstances of hearing loss. If one ear has "moderate hearing impairment" and the other ear "meets the standards of mild hearing impairment," a waiver can be considered, the Air Force said in the release.
Applicants with diagnosed food allergies will also now be considered for a waiver, "provided there has been no anaphylaxis or serious systemic reaction," the service said.
Retired Chief Master Sgt. Eric Benken, the Air Force's top enlisted leader from 1996 to 1999 under former President Bill Clinton's Department of Defense, told Military.com in an interview Thursday that the changes were "long overdue."
"I trust the medical community of the Air Force to know when someone is deployable, when they're not deployable," Benken told Military.com. "I always felt that, in some cases, it was far too restrictive."
These new waiver changes followed the Department of the Air Force missing its recruiting goal in 2023, by 10%, for the first time since 1999.
In 2024, several policy changes led the way for the service to hit its active-duty goals, barely skating by with 39 extra enlisted recruits to hit its benchmark of 27,100 new service members.
Increasing the Department of the Air Force's body fat composition requirement up to 26% for men and 36% for women brought in a staggering 5,196 new recruits across the Air Force, Space Force, Air Force Reserve and Air National Guard, Military.com previously reported.
Related: Prep Courses, Policy Tweaks Largely Drove the Military's Recruiting Success in 2024
