Seoul, Sep 8 (IANS) A leading doctors’ group on Sunday demanded that the government scrap its plan to increase medical school admission quotas for 2025 and 2026 and discuss possible quota adjustments for 2027 or beyond.
The call by Korean Medical Association (KMA) officials came after the government said last week that it was willing to revise the plan for 2026 if the doctors’ community presented a “reasonable” alternative, Yonhap news agency reported.
The Yoon Suk-Yeol administration has pledged to increase medical school admissions quotas by 2,000 seats per year over the next five years to address a shortage of doctors, and in June finalized a quota hike of about 1,500 students for next year.
Most trainee doctors have been on strike since February. This has caused serious disruption to the national health care system.
“The government should scrap plans to increase medical school seats for 2025 and 2026 and discuss possible adjustments for 2027 or beyond,” a KMA official said.
This is a pre-condition for us joining a joint consultative body with the Government and the parties, but I don’t think we need to tell them our position again because we have made it clear that the huge increase is absurd.
The government and the ruling People’s Power Party have also proposed the establishment of a joint consultative body involving rival parties and the medical community.
KMA chief Lim Hyun-taek said in an online post on Saturday that the government and rival parties need to come up with “a reasonable, unified proposal” to solve the current medical crisis.
The government has said it is not possible to reconsider the quota increase plan for next year as the processes for college admissions are already underway.
In response to the KMA’s demand, a senior official in the President’s Office said that the issue of extending medical school admissions for next year has already been decided. This makes it practically impossible to discuss it.
However, the official said the government is ready to discuss a possible increase from 2026 onwards without being tied to a specific number.
“Although changes cannot be made for 2025 starting from 2026, if the medical community presents reasonable grounds, we can discuss the matter without any restriction on the numbers,” the official said.
–IANS
SHK/CBT
