CHAPTER VI
EVACUATION OF THE UNFIT—RELIEVING THE PRESSURE ON THE HOSPITALS AND CONVALESCENT DEPOTS—BACK TO DUTY OR AUSTRALIA—METHODS ADOPTED—TRANSPORT OF INVALIDS BY SEA AND TRAIN.
CHAPTER VI
It became evident, both during the crisis and before the expected attack in August, that Egypt must be cleared of those who were not likely to be fit for service in the immediate future. The necessary effort made to send invalids away for change, and to send the permanently disabled home, involved important questions of policy the determination of which took time. A number of problems at once obtruded themselves. Who was to be permanently invalided, and how was the determination to be reached? Who was to be sent away temporarily, and for how long was he to go? Where was he to be sent to? What was to be done with malingerers, of whom there was a small but sufficiently numerous percentage? As regards the first question: is a man, for example, who has lost an eye permanently invalided? Is he fit for base duty in Egypt, or must he be sent home? It is hardly fair to send him to the front and expose him to the risk of total blindness. In this particular case, in view of the possibilities of the development of ophthalmia in Egypt—which, by the way, did not prove nearly as serious as was anticipated—it was decided that the man who had lost one eye should be sent home as permanently unfit. Men who had lost a limb were put in the same category. It might be argued that such men were quite fit for clerical work, and that one-eyed men were quite fit for ordinary guard work, for which, indeed, the demand was overwhelming. The view already indicated, however, was taken, and these men were sent to their homes to be discharged. But when these definite and obvious cases were disposed of, there remained some thousands of men whose cases were full of difficulty. In each hospital Boards were accordingly appointed to investigate their cases and to fully answer the questions set out in the following Army Form B 179.