Gov't to pour additional 77.5B won into emergency healthcare

Prime Minister Han Duck-soo said that the Cabinet had agreed to pour an additional 77.5 billion won ($56.7 million) into the country's emergency healthcare system as the ongoing strike by Korea's junior doctors entered its 100th day on Wednesday.

A doctor walks down a corridor inside a university hospital in Seoul as the ongoing junior doctors' strike entered its 100th day on Wednesday. [YONHAP]

Prime Minister Han Duck-soo said that the Cabinet had agreed to pour an additional 77.5 billion won ($56.7 million) into the country's emergency healthcare system as the ongoing strike by Korea's junior doctors entered its 100th day on Wednesday.

The government has already invested 128.5 billion won to hire additional medical personnel and compensate doctors and nurses working overtime and on holidays at tertiary hospitals.

The prime minister said the additional funds will be used to support staff at general hospitals nationwide and to provide additional support to train and compensate nurses, whom he called “the people who are working the hardest to fill the gap in healthcare provision left by junior doctors on strike.”

Around 12,000 trainee doctors have been on strike since Feb. 20 to protest the government’s plan to hike the annual medical school admissions quota.

Medical students across the country are also boycotting classes en masse in opposition to the increase, while professors at teaching hospitals have begun taking days off mid-week to protest the strain on the healthcare system brought on by the prolonged strike.

Han also promised that the government would ask police to investigate allegations that medical students are pressuring classmates to boycott online classes and summoning them to sign and submit requests to take time off from school.

“To interfere with individuals’ freedom of expression and force them to participate in collective action is a form of violence,” he said.

The Education Ministry has already asked police to look into reports that students at three medical schools had strong-armed their classmates into taking leaves of absence.

The prime minister also called on representatives of the medical community and junior doctors to engage in dialogue with the government and end their strike.

“While we cannot untangle all of our misunderstandings and differences at once, I believe that we can resolve any problem if people come forward with a little bit of openness and courage.”

Representatives of the country’s main medical professional associations have refused to hold talks with the government and insisted that dialogue can only take place if the Yoon administration first scraps the medical recruitment expansion plan.

But the government has pressed ahead with the reform and finalized its first increase in medical school admissions in 27 years on Friday, eight days after the Seoul High Court dismissed doctors' and medical students’ request for an injunction to halt the admissions quota hike.

Under the admissions plan approved by the Korean Council for University Education, 40 medical schools nationwide will admit 4,567 new students next year, an increase of 1,509, or 49.3 percent, over last year's.

However, medical professors and doctors on Monday asked universities to postpone the announcement of detailed admissions plans until the Supreme Court rules on the legality of the quota increase.

While the Korean Medical Association and Medical Professors Association of Korea said they would await and accept the Supreme Court’s decision during their joint press conference on the same day, they argued that universities should post their medical school admissions plans only after a final ruling in the case.

Medical schools are scheduled to post their individual admissions plans on Friday. Once posted, the plans are irreversible.

BY MICHAEL LEE [lee.junhyuk@joongang.co.kr]