Speaking about Nurses... does anyone here seriously think it
takes just 2 years to train a professional soldier?
There will always obviously be a difference in quality and
experience between your NSF and regular... just because a lady only
has two years to serve does not mean she cannot become a nurse in
any sense of the word... and of course, being a nurse is not to
only potential NS role for women, just as not every guy HAS to
fight as a vocation in NS. But let's just consider nursing as one
of the NS vocations:
But plenty of useful stuff can still be learnt and done in 2 years,
it's not as if there's any reason to believe to NSF nurse will be
totally incompetent... and given a time of crisis where there are
many injured, anybody would prefer a person with any level of
knowledge in nursing then people with no knowledge at all.
All in all it's quite feasible, if you have modest goals and know
where to draw the line. The idea is not to make each and every NSF
nurse into a full-fledged professional like those who do it as a
profession, but rather a force of personnel that is trained in the
basics, competent within their jobscope, and takes the pressure off
the professionals in times of crisis by managing lesser cases.
After all we are trying to give citizens a secondary National
Defence capability, not make their into their whole life.
The other (and I suppose more important) question is if our soceity
is willing to foot the social and economic costs of implementing
such a thing. There will be costs, no doubt about it and people are
split on it. Some even question a need for NS altogether.
Personally I feel that if there's no NS, there will be no Singapore
as we know it today (and it's not just the bad things, but the good
ones as well)... female NS isn't a bad idea... but it needs to be
carefully considered.
