THE MEDICAL BOARDS.

Manawatu Herald, Volume XXXVIII, Issue 1634, 7 November 1916, Page 3

THE MEDICAL BOARDS.

TO COMMENCE OPERATIONS

DEALING WITH UNFIT CLAIM-

ANTS

Tho first revolution of the compulsory machinery under the Military Service Act will be made this week, when the Medical Boards appointed under the Act will sit to hear appeals of men who have been summoned for service under clause 35, and who are claiming exemption on the grounds of medical unfitness.

■Two medical Boards, one for the North Island and one for the South, are now in existence, and will begin work this week. There is one Board for each island at present, but other Boards will be ci’eated later if the services of suitable medical officers can be secured. The officers are required to give the whole of their time to the work under the Act, and the general shortage of doctors has made it difficult for the Defence Department to fill its requirements.

It was explained to a Palmerston Standard reporter yesterday morning by a member of the Headquarters Staff that every precaution was to be observed in order that the work of the Boards would he carried out with the utmost fairness and impartiality and consideration for the men. To attain that end the Boards had been constituted accordingly, and would be composed in each case of medical men from distant parts of the Dominion, so that doctors and men will be quite unknown to each other. The men will then be presented singly for examination, and no consideration except medical fitness or unfitness will be taken into account. The North Island Boai’d will sit at Palmerston to-day and at Auckland on Thursday, Friday and Saturady. The South Island Board will sit at Christchurch to-day, and at Dunedin on Thursday, Friday and Sat nrda v.

Apparently the sitting at Palmerston will be a light one, and so Car objections have only been received from two brothers, who claim medical unfitness.

The Medical Boards will probably coniine their sittings to the chief centres, in order to economise time. Men who are required to undergo medical examination will he provided with travelling warrants, and will he directed where and when to present themselves before one of the Boards.

The pressure of work is likely to become severe after November 13 th, when considerable bodies of compulsorily enlisted men will have to be dealt with, but it may not bo necessary for the specially constituted Boards to see all the recruits of this (dass. Some of Ihe men will not allege physical unlitness, and in that case they may go before the military doctors in (he ordinary way.