The Birmingham age-herald., 1916-03-26
NOVEL CASES COME
 UP FOR ATTENTION
 0F PENSION BOARD
Trench Foot" Now One of the Most Common Forms of Disability Among
 the British

London, March L.--(Special Correspond ence.)---One of the scandals of the war which will have to be tackled by Parlia- begun, is the absence of provision for soldiers who are invalided out of the army although their invalidism may have been directly due to the hardships of their service.
 Already the newspapers are full of stories of men who have fought at one of the many fronts at which Britain is now fighting, entering the workhouse or appearing in police courts for stealing food. and assuredly there is no desire on the part of the public to stint the man who has fought and suffered for his country of anything. Pensions on the most liberal scale, running in many cases to over 5 a week, are provided for men who have been partially or wholly dis abled by wounds, but apparently the case of the man who contracts, say tubercu- losis in the trenches, ilas been entirely overlooked.
 As matter of fact it has been oyer- looked because there never has been a war fought under conditions of winter hardship such as this, ana when the pensions act was drawn early in the war we had no experience of the large list of disablements from disease as distinct from wounds.
 One of the commonest causes of dis ablement, which is not provided for now in the pension regulations, is what has come to be known to the military doc tors as trench foot'' It Is the result of standing for days and weeks in water sodden, and often water filled trenches, with the water just above freezing point At first it was loosely called frostbite, but as a matter of fact 1t is something quite different When there is frost the trench becomes dry and comparatively comfortable. What apparently happens is that the cold water deprives the skin of all it's natural oil. The foot swells up and becomes extremely painful and in bad cases-and there are plenty of bad cases-the use of the foot is permanent ly lest. The trouble about recognizing this as pensionable injury is that, this winter at least, the sufferers have only their own carelessness to blame.
 After many experiments the army doc tors last winter discovered that no man need suffer from trench foot if he rubbed his feet thoroughly with grease before entering the trench. The grease must be thoroughly worked into the skin and it is a long and tedious job, taking an
 
 is regularly served out to the men and they are ordered to use it, but a good many of them decide to risk trench foot rather than take the trouble to grease their feet. Some of them, it is said, even court the disease as a better way tc get home than via the wounded route.
 Tuberculosis is another disease that is giving the army authorities good deal of trouble. There is a lot of tuberculosis in England in ordinary times, and it is hard to prove that it has been contracted in the army. Thousands of men who have never been at the front have been invalided out for it. and no one can claim that the open air life and good food of a properly conducted home camp, are anything but good for this disease. In these cases there can be no doubt that the men were developing the disease when they joined. The case of the men in whom it is detected after they have gone to the front is rather more difficult, for it is arsuable that the hardships to which they were exposed may have brought it on, although in this case, too, the open air life ought to be rather in their favor.
 Another class of invalid for which there is even less to be said is the man suf- fering from chronic appendicitis hernia, or some other condition that can be cured by simple operation, and who refuses to undergo that operation. The English working class have a blind and unreasoning fear of the surgeons knife and prefer to suffer i'll health to taking the small risk of operative relief. The army authorities have no power to com pei soldier to submit to an operation, so that the only course open in such cases is to invalid the man out. It is a nice question whether he deserves