"Government Breaks Its Own Principles... Medical School Quota Expansion and Public Medical School Establishment Must Be Promptly Pursued"
[Asia Economy Reporter Lim Cheol-young] The Korean Health and Medical Workers' Union (KHMU) has claimed that the government's policy to reallow medical students who collectively refused to take the national medical licensing examination an opportunity to retake the exam is a 'special privilege.'
On the 3rd, the KHMU issued a statement saying, "The government has broken its own principles regarding the refusal of the national exam, which was made by the students' own will," and emphasized, "Allowing those who individually refused the national exam to retake it for the purpose of relief is an act of deceiving the public through special privileges by means of expediency and trickery, and it undermines the principles of fairness and equity."
The KHMU added, "We cannot help but be shocked that the government pushed forward the reallowance of the medical students' exam without expressing any intention to expand medical school quotas or establish public medical schools."
They reiterated that the solution to the unprecedented situation where medical students refused to take the national exam in protest against government policies is to expand medical school quotas and promote the establishment of public medical schools.
The KHMU stated, "The true resolution and conclusion is not a pardon in the form of allowing a retake of the national exam," and added, "It must be the prompt promotion of expanding medical school quotas and establishing public medical schools. The government must show its willingness to improve the system to address the shortage of doctors and the polarized distribution of medical personnel for the public to accept it."
Earlier, the Ministry of Health and Welfare announced on December 31 last year a separate plan to hold an exam to collectively provide relief to about 2,700 medical students who had collectively refused to take the national exam. The plan involves dividing the exam scheduled for the second half of next year into two sessions, allowing those who refused the exam to take it by the end of this month.
The medical students who collectively refused the exam last year did so in protest against the government's expansion of medical school quotas and the establishment of new public medical schools, refusing to take the practical portion of the medical licensing exam. Although the government, ruling party, and medical community reached a difficult agreement in September last year, the medical students refused the exam despite being given two additional opportunities to reapply.
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