MEDICAL TESTS

Dominion, Volume 11, Issue 96, 16 January 1918, Page 8

MEDICAL TESTS

THE FIT AND THE UNFIT

REJECTIONS FROM CAMP UNAVOIDABLE

A deputation from the Second Division League asked the Prime Minister in Christchurch for an assurance that any married man sent into camp would be medically fit. Tho representatives of the league pointed out the hardship that was caused when a man was iequired to dispose of his business and leave his family, only to be turned out of camp a week or two later as medically iinfit.

The point raised by the deputation has been before the mediral authorities since the inception of the compulsory system, and it has been the subject of many official statements. The n.cdical officers insist that in New Zealand, as in every other belligerent country, it is impossible to avoid wastage in the camps. That is to say, there will always be some recruits who are passed as fit at the first examination and who develop weaknesses in the course of training. The most skilful doctor cannot tell in every case how the human body is going to be affected by unaccustomed conditions. A mau who appears absolutely Sit may break down in training, while another man who looked a doubtful subject at the first medical examination may be as hard as nails.

"The demand that the doctors should be infallible is absurd," said a medical officer who lias had wide experience in the handling of recruits. "We are bound to make some mistakes, and we are bound to come across many cases where the only way of determining fitness is to give the man a week or two in camp. Take, for example, the case of a recruit who comes before a medical board and states that lie has a weak knee, injured at footbal l many years earlier. A very close examination of the knee may fail to reveal any trace of weakness. Tho man has lived a qtnet life for a long time, and the knee has suffered no itrains. It looks normal and the man can move it freely. Are wo to declare him unfit because that knee may give him trouble when ho gets into camp? If wo did, we would open the door wide to the malingerer, and we would release some men who were simply reviving memories of injuries long since healed. The Second Division men would have been the Erst to protest if we had dealt with the First Division recruits in a loose way.

"I have examined many men who state that they arc sufferers from rheumatism. They may have some swollen joints, or on the other hand they may show no signs of the trouble at all. Experience has shown thai 'many of these men become thoroughly fit in camp. The general improvement in their health, owing to tlic_ wholesome open-air life, regular exercise, .and good food, clears away any remaining traces of the rheumatism- that oiics troubled them. But tlicro will he other men whose rheumatism will assort itself the first night they have to spend in damp c'othes in a tent. Are the medical boards, therefore, to reject all men who claim to have had attacks of rheumatism at some stage in their lives? , "The only safe rule seems to Dβ that if a man has a reasonably good chance of proving fit under camp conditions he should be sent to camp. If he breaks down and has to be discharged he lias 'done his bit,' and he is still better off than the men who have gone to the front and risked their lives. His sacrifice has not been in vain, since a system that -would have kept him out of camp altogether -would have deprived tho country of many hundreds of fit soldiers. By goiu#; into camp he has made it possible for us to sort out tiie fit men from among the doubtful cases."