Up to 1,000 new doctors could face unemployment
In the UK that is, as reported in the Telegraph (hat tip to Dr Punna Wong for the link)
Up to 1,000 new doctors will face unemployment next year as there are too few training places available, it has been warned.
Official projections from the Department of Health body in charge of medical education shows that hundreds of medical graduates will be without a job next year, the Telegraph has learned.
The number of places in medical schools has been expanded since 2002 with the aim of the UK becoming self sufficient in doctors.
However, applicants from within the EU and a shortage of training posts means that for the first time there is a genuine prospect of doctors being unemployed.
It costs the UK taxpayer, £260,000 to put each medical student through university and each student graduates with debt averaging £70,000.
The issue is being raised at the British Medical Association’s junior doctors conference in London.
The situation is already bleak in Malaysia as fresh medical graduates face difficulty in obtaining Houseman training posts (a wait of months is now the norm) and it will get worse with the glut in Doctors due to too many local medical schools and returning graduates from overseas.
A sobering thought indeed, yet many are still adamant on getting a medical degree – they need to know the situation and must not complain when they face trouble getting a job when they graduate.
We’ll soon see medical graduates applying for pharma sales jobs and other health related jobs because they cannot get work as housemen.
See related MMR posts on the Glut of Doctors, especially:
How many doctors are there in Malaysia?
Dear CSL it’s too late to close the barn door as the horse has already bolted
A licence to churn out poor quality doctors?
And yet the powers that be in Malaysia dont seem to hear/listen. Quite apart from the proliferation of local medical schools there are also of course those that go overseas in droves and we’re expected to “polish them” up and get them to sit our exams when they come back – for those who choose to go to schools that have not been accredited. It is so completely ridiculous
Repeated requests to reduce the intake at UM from 200 to 160 or even 180 to allow us to focus on post graduate training have been repeatedly rejected at the highest level..
I myself have been telling UM students every chance i have that the future aint too bright for them and that they better start distinguishing themselves either scholastically or at the very least in their bed side manners – or they better start honing their culinary or other skills to prepare themselves for the future….
Adeeba