INVALIDED SOLDIERS.

Press, Volume LIV, Issue 16341, 12 October 1918, Page 10

INVALIDED SOLDIERS.

. ft — HOSPITAL ACCOMMODATION IN NEW ZEALAND. (press association telegram.) AUCKLAND, October 11. An extension of the provision for the treatment of soldiers who return to New Zealand suffering from consumption was announced by the Minister of Defence to-day. A new sanatorium is to be erected at Hatuma, Hawko'a Bay. Tenders for the work have long been out, and are to close shortly. The contract will provide for the completion of the work in April ilext. Sir James Allen says the sanatorium will be a most complete block of buildings, and in designing it the greatest care has been taken to make it as perfect as an institution of the kind can be made.

Referring to the suggestion that the Government had not looked far enough ahead in regard to hospital requirements for wounded soldiers, the Minister said:—"As a matter of fact, we have been constantly looking ahead. The difficulty has been to determine the maximum number of beds likely to be required. As to the present situation, on September 30th we had_ 1065 returned soldiers as in-patients in the hospitals, and also 185 in-patients brought from the camps in. New Zealand—l2so in all. lam advised that the maximum number of beds we are ever likely to require in the civil and Defence hospitals and convalescent homes is about 2000. The provision we have madq already, including the proposed additions to the Rotorua institutions, gives a grand total of nearly 1900 beds. Tn case the wax were to end shortly, and tho soldiers' were to be returned more rapidly than we anticipate, we have practically unlimited hospital accommodation at the Trentham, Featherston. and Narrow Neok camps. Special facilites already exist in the*© camps, especially at Trentham, where an operating theatre has been established. If more beds are neressary'the annexe to the Auckland Hospital can easily be enlarged. It has already been suggested that add to it wards for 60 beds. The Rotorna accommodation ronld also, if necessary, be extended to 500 beds. I thinV Che pub% will realise that all nossible forethought has been exercised."