CLAIMS OF T.B. MEN

Dominion, Volume 15, Issue 2, 27 September 1921, Page 4

CLAIMS OF T.B. MEN

INSURANCE AND PENSIONS SUPPORT FROM N.Z.R.S.A. EXECUTIVE A deputation representing returned soldiers suffering from tuberculosis waited yesterday upon the Dominion Executive of the N.Z.R.S.A., and urged it to press certain claims upon the Government. The deputation considered that there should be provision for insuring the lives of tuberculosis men and for granting discharged tuberculosis cases a permanent minimum pension. It also considered that where a man was to* be examined in connection with a pension, the examination should be macle by the specialist who had attended him and who knew the particulars of his case. The Dominion secretary (Mr. J. Pow) said that he had already interviewed the authorities in regard to the question of insurance. He had asked the Government Life Insurance Commissioner whether the Government would entertain the idea of insuring thv tuberculosis men in tho way outlined in the “Returned Soldiers’ Handbook.” The commissioner had replied in the negative, stating that lie was acting as trustee for the hundreds of thousands of policy-holders in the Government Insurance Office, and could not accept tuberculosis men, as it was a written law. In all associations that tuberculosis men wore uninsurable. Recently, tho speaker met the Commissioner, the actuary, and the secretary of the Government Life Insurance Office, and put the case before them, pointing out- that it had been laid down that anyone suffering from disease contracted on active service would have tho loading qf his life insurance paid by the Government. Tho actuary said that he had no statistics upon which to compute the loading, and the speaker suggested, tho collection of the necessary statistics through the various sanatoria. Probably, Mr. Pow concluded, tho result would bo that all the tuberculosis men discharged from sanatoria would be given a chance to insure. The authorities had promised to let him know the result as soon as they obtained the statistics. The executive referred the tuberculosis men’s requests to the standing eub-coin-mittec "for prompt action."