hmm. so how much are they being compensated?
Originally posted by Rednano:from: http://www.sgforums.com/forums/10/topics/344043
Parents: It was our last resort
By Crystal ChanTHEIR household income is just $2,000. So how, their friends asked them, can they take on the Government?
You will lose, their friends said. And you will be worse off because of the costs.
But Mr Tan Kian Lee, 50, and his wife, Madam Hor Hong Kiow, 47, refused to buckle under the enormity of the challenge.
'It was a nerve-racking experience,' said Mr Tan, of taking on the Ministry of Defence.
Their son, Chia Wee, had become an invalid after he was found unconscious while he was in National Service
He was their hope. He was to have gone to university and supported them when he graduated.
Mr Tan said in Mandarin: 'My son began NS as a healthy soldier but he came out a vegetable. He used to jog and do standing broad jumps every day. Now, he's like a baby.'
When four years of talks with Mindef and the Attorney-General's Chambers came to naught, the couple sued Mindef for compensation - and took it all the way to High Court.
On 16 Jan, the Tans' dogged determination paid off when the High Court ruled that Chia Wee, now 26, was entitled to compensation.
'Many people have told us that we're very brave to sue the Government,' Madam Hor, a bank teller, said in Mandarin, 'especially when we're not rich. But I believe anyone in our position would have done the same.
'Some people even told us we may lose the case as we were up against the Government and we'd have to pay costs if we lost.
'We're not greedy. Going to court was really a last resort and we're really grateful to our lawyer. Till today, our lawyer has not charged us for his work.'
Their lawyer, Dr Lau Teik Soon, is a former People's Action Party Member of Parliament for Serangoon Gardens.
Looking at photos of Chia Wee in happier times, Mr Tan, who is unemployed, sighed: 'He had hoped to go to UniSIM to study business and support us after he graduated.
'He was enthusiastic about NS despite being a storeman. He obeyed instructions without complaint and always smiled when he left for the camp.
'Every day, we'd buy him supper so he could have his favourite burgers when he came home.'
Chia Wee, a business diploma holder from Temasek Polytechnic, had told his parents he could do a variety of jobs with a business degree.
Mr Tan said: 'Now, he can only stare at us when we visit him.
'We have accepted that he'll never be able to look after us. At least, we'll get some compensation so we can care for him.'
The couple's ordeal began when the Singapore Armed Forces called with the bad news that Chia Wee was discovered unconscious at the foot of his three-storey barracks at Seletar East Camp.
He was found at 6pm on 3 Aug 2005.
Mr Tan recalled: 'I was so shocked that I could barely stand. My daughter, Chia Min, had to support me.'
The tragedy affected Chia Min so much that she did badly for her O levels that year, scoring 29 points for her best five subjects.
She re-sat for her O levels in 2006 and scored 15 points, qualifying for polytechnic courses.
Mr Tan and Madam Hor sought an explanation from Mindef but details were sketchy as there were no witnesses.
One of Mr Tan's friends, who lives in Pasir Ris, took him to a meet-the-people's session with Defence Minister Teo Chee Hean in November 2005.
Mr Tan said: 'My friend spoke on my behalf and one of Mr Teo's assistants wrote a letter. Within 10 days, Mindef replied, saying it was investigating.'
In April 2006, Mindef officials met Mr Tan, informing him they did not know what led to Chia Wee's tragedy as there were no witnesses. The ministry offered to give Mr Tan $500 a month for five years to help him care for Chia Wee at home.
Mindef also said it would not provide additional compensation, claiming its checks showed Chia Wee was not hurt in the line of duty.
Not knowing what to do, Mr Tan delayed discharging his son, who remains in a step-down facility at Tan Tock Seng Hospital (TTSH).
Why didn't he just accept the monthly compensation of $500?
Mr Tan said: 'I wouldn't get anything after five years and my son needs lifelong care. I was also worried that if I accepted this offer, it would mean I couldn't pursue legal action against Mindef.'
In March 2007, Mindef stopped paying for Chia Wee's hospitalisation after having paid more than $30,000 for his medical treatment.
Mr Tan said: 'I took that to mean Mindef was absolving itself of any liability. That's unfair because my son got injured in camp, not while he was off-duty.
'At that point, my wife and I considered legal action as it was the only chance we had of getting compensation.
'It's not that we want to leave Chia Wee in TTSH permanently, but we can't afford to hire a nurse to care for him at home.'
Madam Hor's colleague recommended Dr Lau to the couple and he, together with Ms Rajvant Kaur, represented them for free.
In August 2007, the Tans had a meeting with the Attorney-General's Chambers to resolve the dispute, but to no avail.
Dr Lau told The New Paper: 'We were hoping to settle the issue of liability amicably but it wasn't a meeting of two minds.'
Soon after that, the Tans sued.
Mr Tan said: 'I spent two hours reading my 40-page affidavit every day. My English is limited and I was worried of slipping up while testifying.'
After a four-day hearing last month, Justice Tay Yong Kwang ruled in the Tans' favour.
Mindef has not appealed against the verdict.
Dr Lau told The New Paper that the next step is to assess the degree of Chia Wee's disability and, using Manpower Ministry guidelines, work out how much he should get.
Mr Tan said: 'We would have had to pay the A-G's costs if we had lost. It was a risk we had to take. But if we didn't take this step, we wouldn't get any compensation.
'Of course, we're happy to win. After such a long time, we finally got justice.'
====================================================
They need to buy $3,000 bed for son
THE Tans have no proper bed of their own.
Now they will have to buy a motorised special bed costing $3,000 for their son.
The couple, who also have a daughter in polytechnic, live in a spartan three-room flat at Old Airport Road.
It is a flat that indicates their modest income.
The family sleep on mattresses on the floor instead of on beds.
Their living room has a sofa and two armchairs, but no coffee table.
Instead of Chia Wee supporting them in their old age, Mr Tan and Madam Hor will now have to care for him for the rest of his life.
They spend about $2,000 a year on their daughter's school fees.
They intend to use the compensation, which the court will assess at a later date, to hire a nurse to care for Chia Wee at home.
His vegetative state means he has to be fed through a tube and wear diapers all the time.
The Tans have decided against placing Chia Wee in a nursing home as it will cost between $1,200 and $1,800 a month.
Mr Tan said: 'If our son stays in a home, we'd have to spend money on transport to see him every day.
'I'm not working, so I can care for him at home. We hope to use the compensation money to buy diapers, milk and a proper bed for him.'
Bendemeer Medical Marketing & Nursing Services, which provides training for home nursing, is willing to work out an affordable package for the Tans.
Its head nurse, who asked to be known as Ms Angie, said: 'We can train Mr Tan to change the diapers, clean him and top up the feeding tube.'
She added that Chia Wee's parents will need to acquire a nursing bed, the type used in hospitals, to prevent him from developing bedsores.
She explained: 'The nursing beds are motorised and have ripple mattresses which have an alternating pressure pump and a special air-mattress. These will boost blood circulation and prevent bedsores.'
Such beds cost around $3,000 but MsAngie said the company can source for donated beds from previous patients.
i only saw this thread.
the deceased recruit from ninja company.
went delirious ON THE FERRY back.
Originally posted by sinicker:i only saw this thread.
the deceased recruit from ninja company.
went delirious ON THE FERRY back.
Originally posted by sinicker:i only saw this thread.
the deceased recruit from ninja company.
went delirious ON THE FERRY back.
But he was found with an abnormally high temperature and pulse. Not to mention that he was ONLY given Att. B when he went to see the MO.
Originally posted by dumbdumb!:hmm. so how much are they being compensated?
its based on:
http://www.sgforums.com/forums/1390/topics/334506
Training Injury Report: Compensation for Service Injury / Death
Originally posted by Forbiddensinner:But he was found with an abnormally high temperature and pulse. Not to mention that he was ONLY given Att. B when he went to see the MO.
perhaps its time for the MO camp doctors to erase their 1st mentality mindset of "all sure chao keng kengsters..."
Originally posted by Rednano:
perhaps its time for the MO camp doctors to erase their 1st mentality mindset of "all sure chao keng kengsters..."
it IS bookout day, maybe the recruit himself requested no sickbay so he can go home rest? and since he IS going to bookout, no point giving a att c.
Originally posted by sinicker:i only saw this thread.
the deceased recruit from ninja company.
went delirious ON THE FERRY back.
ninja coy? no wonder. their training is crazy.
and unless there's obvious symptoms of fever, the commanders will seldom allow recruits to report sick during field camp. maybe that is why the injury will build up until book out day.
i am from pes C bmt, so i understand that the field camp was the most siong thing in pes C bmt. coupled with the fact that the past few days we have been having very hot days with heavy downpour, which isn't very helpful to one's health. commanders and peers should have paid more attention to each other.
this is the failure of SAF to take proper care of the soilder .. when I was a recruit I had high fever for entire week but was put in a sick bay but the medic in charge of the sick bay was trying to slack by under declared my temperature so he has less work and I was discharged with Attend B, despite my high temperature I continued with my training , I do not know about the system now , when you were sick and went to see MO you are somtime treated like a criminal , the fact is I really hate going to the medical centre and I do not have a choice I still remember my SGT during BMT ordered me to report sick because he touch my forehead and feel I had a high temp, I went to to medical centre again and once again got discharged due to the magic the medic performed. these MO and medic are just mortal who are trying to chang keng do less work and in the end it is the really sick that suffers and this is SAF
RIP, my fellow soldier. You will not be forgotten.
My deepest condolences to the family.
Originally posted by deathmaster:ninja coy? no wonder. their training is crazy.
and unless there's obvious symptoms of fever, the commanders will seldom allow recruits to report sick during field camp. maybe that is why the injury will build up until book out day.
i am from pes C bmt, so i understand that the field camp was the most siong thing in pes C bmt. coupled with the fact that the past few days we have been having very hot days with heavy downpour, which isn't very helpful to one's health. commanders and peers should have paid more attention to each other.
RIP and condolence to the parents.
ninja coy??? many who had just pop from there should know. His peers should know.
global warming, weather change........ can there be some flexibilities when exposed to extreme weather.
heat exhaustion - had there been any statistic of cases within SAF. Causes & Prevention.
Originally posted by Shayn:On my cousin’s family behalf, i sincerely thanks everyone who send their regards. We really wish SAF will give us the truth and start to revamp the system, so that infuture the new enlistees will not fall into the same tragedy.
And we hope that SAF will not cover up this incident like they always did, because i believe everyone knows that, they always like to cover up the news, so that all of this incident will not tarnish their image.
Tomorrows is his last day of wake. Haiz….
do post what SAF have to say for this. tekong medical centre has improve quite abit recently with a few decent MOs there and a good senior medic. cannot see how they could screw that badly.
My condolence to the family thou, it must be tough of them to lose a son this way.
anyway he is PES C for what reason?
Originally posted by Cycwkc:
During the field camp, they slept sitting down when the tents flooded during the thunderstorm in the early mornings. They have to fend for themselves…. yet its never strike SAF that when there’s lightning and thunderstorm, they should not let them sleep in the open.
Do you think a war will stop just because its raining and theres thunder and lightning? The conditions NSF are put through are definitely not easy but the purpose is to train them for war and battle ready should there ever be a need.
If we treat all the soldiers like little babies and bring them back to bunk whenever it rains etc, we do not even need bother about serving NS as all that have been trained would be a bunch of sissies that will not even be able to handle anything nature throws at them so lets not even say an enermy.
I rmb my times when the sgts punished the whole platoon,those on status(att B ONLY) were excused doing pushups.
Those normal duties but excused smthing such as RMJ are not spared from the pushups. Those excuse hand status were to do crunches as punishment instead.
In that case,where is the fairness?Fit or not fit, you still kana punished.
Hopefully the investigation will allow the family some closure, it is very sad to lose a young man in his prime this way..
However, do note that confidential information should stay confidential. Thanks.
Originally posted by seancannot:this is the failure of SAF to take proper care of the soilder .. when I was a recruit I had high fever for entire week but was put in a sick bay but the medic in charge of the sick bay was trying to slack by under declared my temperature so he has less work and I was discharged with Attend B, despite my high temperature I continued with my training , I do not know about the system now , when you were sick and went to see MO you are somtime treated like a criminal , the fact is I really hate going to the medical centre and I do not have a choice I still remember my SGT during BMT ordered me to report sick because he touch my forehead and feel I had a high temp, I went to to medical centre again and once again got discharged due to the magic the medic performed. these MO and medic are just mortal who are trying to chang keng do less work and in the end it is the really sick that suffers and this is SAF
Then those MOs finish their NS and go kill more patients while working in public hospitals. It's no secret that the SG doctors in hospitals are so lousy and often misdiagnose or give bad medicine, causing patients to die. I think there should be a relook into the medical school here and the poor standards of teaching that is causing these incompetent MOs to roam free in Singapore causing the deaths of people in camps and in public hospitals.
I know at least 4 cases of people whose relatives have died because of incompetent local trained doctors in public hospitals.
Originally posted by insidestory:Then those MOs finish their NS and go kill more patients while working in public hospitals. It's no secret that the SG doctors in hospitals are so lousy and often misdiagnose or give bad medicine, causing patients to die. I think there should be a relook into the medical school here and the poor standards of teaching that is causing these incompetent MOs to roam free in Singapore causing the deaths of people in camps and in public hospitals.
I know at least 4 cases of people whose relatives have died because of incompetent local trained doctors in public hospitals.
Originally posted by unclebutcher:
wtf... where have you substantiated your fucking remarks from? poorly trained doctors? lousy? for your info dude, the Singapore medical system is ranked 6th by WHO, so don't go around with your unsubstantiated, inflammatory statements about poor doctors. they work around the clock, some are bound to make mistakes. unfortunately, with doctors their mistakes lead to injury or death. no one is perfect, not me nor you. so don't go around judging the doctors, after all, they are better trained than you, are more highly educated than you. poor standards? try living in malaysia and you come here see whether poor standard or not.
I didn't criticise the Singapore medical system. I said the local trained MOs who serve in public hospitals are incompetent nutjobs. I hope you have the intelligence to discern the difference. The lousy MOs are just a small component of the larger medical system, which has merits elsewhere.
Unsubstantiated? I have known of countless cases of people here who were misdiagnosed by our poorly trained doctors, given unsuitable medication that aggravated their condition. They say the patient is fine and can go, and then the patients leaves the hospital and turned out he hadn't been fine at all and because of late detection, his condition became hopeless.
Or how about my former PC's father, who was given dubious medicine from the LOCAL TRAINED LOUSY DOCTORS, the lousy doc even got the face to admit the medicine is actually still on trial use only, and after taking, the patient who was totally lucid and could talk and laugh to ppl, became delirious and the strong meds weakened his body so much, that he later DIED. Old ppl have very weak immune systems, any bacteria infection when their bodies are weakened can result in fatality. Which was happened to my PC's father, who died cos he had a bacteria infection while in the delirious state after the strong medication that was prescribed for ordinary geriatric (care for the aged) ailments!!!! Later the doctors say the medicine too strong for him and they didn't know! my own relatives, and i know tons of other cases in which the local trained doctors in public hospitals show that they do not know what they are doing and are totally unfit for duty. I have heard so many cases of people saying dun go to a hospital here, go in high chance will not come out, even if not sick go in already will end up dead. Just pay higher premium go private hospital, most of the UK trained docs are there.
And who doesn't know the local doctor keith goh who keep on performing separation surgery on conjoined twins to show off when all the ones he performed on ALL DIE?! He performed on the Nepalese twins and they barely survived, so he wanted to show off and performed on the Iranians who died. And god knows how many more he performed after to show off which the media didn't cover anymore due to loss of interest and he just keeps on doing it that even the Health Minister had to tell him to SHUT UP AND SIT DOWN as he was affecting Singapore's image adversely. And of cos we all know what happened to the original nepalese twins. One dead. One dying.
More highly educated than me? Wow I didn't know you have ESP or something! You're ET? How come you know who you're talking to over this interface? How do you not know I'm THE President's Scholar??! Or a Nobel Prize winner? Just a freaking MO. local medical school what a fucking joke it is!
Originally posted by insidestory:I didn't criticise the Singapore medical system. I said the local trained MOs who serve in public hospitals are incompetent nutjobs. I hope you have the intelligence to discern the difference. The lousy MOs are just a small component of the larger medical system, which has merits elsewhere.
Unsubstantiated? I have known of countless cases of people here who were misdiagnosed by our poorly trained doctors, given unsuitable medication that aggravated their condition. They say the patient is fine and can go, and then the patients leaves the hospital and turned out he hadn't been fine at all and because of late detection, his condition became hopeless. Or how about my former PC's father, who was given dubious medicine from the LOCAL TRAINED LOUSY DOCTORS, the lousy doc even got the face to admit the medicine is actually still on trial use only, and after taking, the patient who was totally lucid and could talk and laugh to ppl, became delirious. Later the doctors say the medicine too strong for him and they didn't know! my own relatives, and i know tons of other cases in which the local trained doctors in public hospitals show that they do not know what they are doing and are totally unfit for duty. I have heard so many cases of people saying dun go to a hospital here, go in high chance will not come out, even if not sick go in already also will do. Just pay higher premium go private hospital, most of the UK trained docs are there.
And who doesn't know the local doctor keith goh who keep on performing separation surgery on conjoined twins to show off when all the ones he performed on ALL DIE?! He performed on the Nepalese twins and they barely survived, so he wanted to show off and performed on the Iranians who died. And god knows how many more he performed after to show off which the media didn't cover anymore due to loss of interest and he just keeps on doing it that even the health minister had to tell him to shut up and stop as he was affecting Singapore's image adversely.
More highly educated than me? Wow I didn't know you have ESP or something! You're ET? How come you know who you're talking to over this interface? How do you not know I'm THE President's Scholar??! Or a Nobel Prize winner? Just a freaking MO. local medical school what a fucking joke it is!