A debt of national gratitude.

The Singaporean nation has a debt of gratitude to any National Serviceman who is harmed while serving NS.

A case is presently in the courts concerning a serviceman who appears to have suffered a head injury while doing NS. Mindef (the Ministry of Defence) are claiming that it was not suffered on active duty since he was back at camp, at the time. In other words, they are seeking to weasel out of paying for his medical support.

The National Serviceman's situation is dire. Jeremy Tan Chia Whee's head injury has left him unable to move or speak and he is fully dependent on doctors and nurses for his needs. Despite this, Mindef, who had been paying 80% of his ward and meal charges (the amount of support for non-service related injuries) stopped paying any support in February 2007. Since then, his parents have had to find 133,000 dollars for his care.

His parents are suing Mindef for full support of his medical costs. I think their suit seems more than fair. Here is a young man, whose life was ruined, while an NS man. He appears to have fallen from a height and sustained a head injury that has severely damaged him. The least that Mindef can do is support is his costs of recovery (if he ever recovers).

It seems to me, that Mindef demands that the young men of Singapore sacrifice two years of their lives (plus 10 years on call), exposing them to risk of death and injury, yet, in return, Mindef is unwilling to bear the costs that result when things go wrong. What kind of values does this reveal? It appears that Mindef does not value the lives of its recruits as much as it values its "right" to expend their lives in its cause.

Jeremy Tan Chia Whee may never live a normal life, again. That he is in this position is the responsibility of Mindef. I think they should show an honourable response to this situation and pay for his full medical costs until such time as he recovers.

If Mindef are going to impose risk of death and injury on young men, they must, in return, be responsible for any and all medical costs incurred - even if they are for the duration of the lives of disabled ex-servicemen. This should not even be an issue that I have to write about - it should be an automatic response, in thanks for the sacrifices the servicemen have made.

Furthermore, if a serviceman dies on duty, the family of that serviceman should be compensated for their loss. After all, for some families the lost son may be the only means of support for his parents in their old age - with him gone, what will they do? There should be generous compensation in all such cases, so that one worry, at least, is not heaped on the family's sorrows: that of finance to replace the support of the lost son.

If service is to be compulsory, it should also come with generous support in the wake of anything untoward happening to a serviceman. That would, I think, be the moral stance.

There should be a collective national debt of gratitude to any serviceman who suffers loss, death or injury in service to his nation. Let us not forget to pay it, when the time comes.

(If you would like to learn more of Ainan Celeste Cawley, a scientific child prodigy, aged eight years and seven months, or his gifted brothers, Fintan, five years exactly, and Tiarnan, twenty-eight months, please go to: http://scientific-child-prodigy.blogspot.com/2006/10/scientific-child-prodigy-guide.html I also write of gifted education, IQ, intelligence, the Irish, the Malays, Singapore, College, University, Chemistry, Science, genetics, left-handedness, precocity, child prodigy, child genius, baby genius, adult genius, savant, wunderkind, wonderkind, genio, гений ребенок prodigy, genie, μεγαλοφυία θαύμα παιδιών, bambino, kind.

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