The crushing defeat by the ruling party in this week’s parliamentary elections is unlikely to cause the government to halt its plan to hike the medical school enrollment quota but is forecast to add further pressure on it to seek solutions to end the prolonged walkout by trainee doctors amid worsening hospital disruptions, experts said Thursday.
The government’s push to increase the number of medical school seats by 2,000 starting next year was a hot-button issue for the April 10 parliamentary elections, as more than 90 percent of South Korea’s 13,000 trainee doctors have walked off the job in protest since Feb. 20.
The current quota is set at 3,058 seats.
“I see the election results as the judgment of the people on the government for undemocratically pressing medical policies while ignoring due procedures,” an official of the Korea Medical Association (KMA) said.
In Wednesday’s general elections, the opposition bloc won a landslide victory by securing over 190 out of 300 parliamentary seats up for grabs
in another major setback for the ruling People Power Party and President Yoon Suk Yeol.
Ryu Ok Hada, a trainee doctor who tendered his resignation, said that the government needs to humbly accept the results of the election and withdraw its plan to increase the admissions quota.
A patient casts a ballot at a polling station for the general elections in the southeastern city of Daegu on April 5, 2024. (Yonhap)
Experts said that Yoon is expected to continue his push for the medical reform plan regardless of the election outcome, and the possibility of the government changing its course on the matter seems low, but it will come under heavier pressure to engage more actively with doctors to find a breakthrough.
Facing worsening health care system chaos, even some ruling party officials have called on the government to review the plan, rather than sticking to the 2,000-person raise.
The government has said it is open to talks, and Yoon met with the chief of a striking trainee doctors’ group earlier this month
, though no immediate breakthrough has been reported.
On Thursday, Yoon said he “will humbly accept the will of the people expressed in the general elections and will strive to reform the administration, stabilize the economy and enhance people’s livelihoods,” according to his office.
Others said that the government could take a tougher stance by resuming administrative steps to suspend the licenses of striking doctors.
Thousands of junior doctors missed a government-set deadline to return to work late last month and are facing the suspension of their licenses. But the government put a hold on the move after Yoon called for exercising flexibility.
“If the government fails to push for even such a popular policy because of the election defeat, Yoon will not be able to work on any other policies during his term,” said Nam Eun-kyung, an official of the Citizens’ Coalition for Economic Justice.
“The election debacle would cause the government to rather focus more on medical reform measures amid a looming lame
duck period,” she added.
Polls have shown broad public support for the enrollment hike plan itself, and the adjustment to medical school admissions is not subject to parliamentary approval.
“As of now, our stance remains unchanged. We are also waiting for a new stance, if any, from the medical community,” a health ministry official said.
This composite photo shows the responses of the ruling People Power Party (R) and the main opposition Democratic Party to TV exit polls projecting the latter’s overwhelming victory at the National Assembly in Seoul on April 10, 2024. (Pool photo) (Yonhap)
The government has been stressing the need for the admission quota increase to address a shortage of doctors, particularly in rural areas and essential medical fields, such as high-risk surgeries, pediatrics, obstetrics and emergency medicine.
Given South Korea’s rapid population aging and other issues, the country is expected to fall short of 15,000 doctors by 2035.
But doctors argue that the med school enrollment quo
ta hike would compromise the quality of medical education and services and create a surplus of physicians, adding that the government must devise ways of better protecting them from malpractice suits and extending compensation to induce more physicians to practice in such “unpopular” areas.
Source: Yonhap News Agency