S.Korea police to question medical body officials over trainee doctors walkout

S.Korea police to question medical body officials over trainee doctors walkout
S.Korea police to question medical body officials over trainee doctors walkout

Hello and welcome to the details of S.Korea police to question medical body officials over trainee doctors walkout and now with the details

Nevin Al Sukari - Sana'a - Doctors chant slogans during a rally to protest against government plans to increase medical school admissions in Seoul, South Korea, March 3, 2024. The banners read "Oppose increasing medical school admissions without talks with the medical community" (in blue) and "Medical education will be harmed in increasing medical school admissions" (in red). — Reuters pic

SEOUL, March 6 — South Korean police today called in for questioning officials from a doctors’ association over accusations they had broken medical law, as authorities kept up pressure for trainee doctors to end a two-week walkout and return to hospitals.

Joo Soo-ho, a spokesperson for the emergency committee of the Korean Medical Association’s (KMA), attended a police station in Seoul this morning, an official at the capital’s police agency said.

Other senior members of the KMA, which represents private practitioners, were also due to be questioned in the following days, said the official.

The move comes after the health ministry filed a complaint against KMA officials for violating the Medical Service Act, alleging they obstructed government actions by supporting trainee doctors who walked off their jobs in protest at planned medical reforms.

Advertisement

Around 9,000 resident and intern doctors, or about 70 per cent of the total, have left their job since Feb. 20, leading to the cancellation of surgeries and treatments and major hospitals receiving less patients.

Police raided KMA offices during a national holiday last week. The KMA at the time called the government’s action “absurd behaviour” and denied it had encouraged trainee doctors to resign, saying they had left their posts of their own volition.

The trainee doctors are protesting against a government plan to increase medical school admissions by 2,000 per year, which authorities say is vital to address doctor shortages in a fast-ageing society.

Advertisement

The government has warned that medical licences of protesting doctors may be suspended or revoked.

The trainee doctors view the government plans as a populist pledge before an April general election that fail to address actual problems in the medical system including pay disparities and lack of care in remote areas.

“The reason people talked about lacking doctors is due to the current collapse of essential and regional medical care (outside Seoul), but increasing the number of medical students will not help things,” Park In-sook, a former lawmaker and professor emeritus of paediatric cardiology at Asan Medical Center, told a briefing by doctors on Tuesday.

Under South Korea’s national health insurance system, hospitals can only receive a fixed fee for “essential” medical care from patients, but the fees set by the government were often so low they did not cover costs, the doctors said.

This had led to doctors shunning “essential” medical fields such as neurosurgery, cardiac surgery, emergency care and paediatrics, and instead going into non-insured fields such as dermatology where they can make money, they said.

The proliferation of low healthcare fees had also led to patients seeking too many treatments and preferring to travel to top hospitals in Seoul for care, further undermining regional healthcare systems, the doctors said.

The health ministry says the increase in medical school admission is needed to fill an expected shortfall of 15,000 doctors projected by 2035.

The government has said its plan will also lift investment and pay for doctors in regional and rural areas and says it has raised fees for doctors in essential services such as paediatrics, obstetrics and emergency medicine since last year and will inject more than 10 trillion won ($7.48 billion) to boost these fees further. — Reuters

These were the details of the news S.Korea police to question medical body officials over trainee doctors walkout for this day. We hope that we have succeeded by giving you the full details and information. To follow all our news, you can subscribe to the alerts system or to one of our different systems to provide you with all that is new.

It is also worth noting that the original news has been published and is available at Malay Mail and the editorial team at AlKhaleej Today has confirmed it and it has been modified, and it may have been completely transferred or quoted from it and you can read and follow this news from its main source.

NEXT US military raises alert level for Europe bases: reports

Author Information

I am Joshua Kelly and I focus on breaking news stories and ensuring we (“Al-KhaleejToday.NET”) offer timely reporting on some of the most recent stories released through market wires about “Services” sector. I have formerly spent over 3 years as a trader in U.S. Stock Market and is now semi-stepped down. I work on a full time basis for Al-KhaleejToday.NET specializing in quicker moving active shares with a short term view on investment opportunities and trends. Address: 838 Emily Drive Hampton, SC 29924, USA Phone: (+1) 803-887-5567 Email: [email protected]