South Korean police on Friday arrested members of the Korean Medical Association (KMA) in Seoul and Gangwon province as part of the government’s response to an ongoing nationwide strike by trainee doctors that has destroyed hospitals’ ability to maintain a functional medical system. A search of the office was conducted.
South Korea is House Approximately 13,000 trainees, interns, and residents are affected, of which approximately 10,000 have left their jobs since mid-February, representing nearly 80% of the nation’s doctors. As of Friday, about 9,000 people had left their jobs and had not returned.
Medical residents perform important tasks in hospitals, especially assisting in emergency rooms and surgeries. According to reports, as many as half of scheduled surgeries have been canceled in some hospitals, and cases of patients being unable to access emergency treatment are increasing. Expanding The authority of nurses to perform roles normally left to doctors.This week, Korean news outlets report In the case of an elderly woman, seven hospitals refused her an ambulance, citing a lack of doctors, resulting in her death. He was pronounced dead on arrival at the eighth hospital.
KMA accused In a statement Friday, the government accused doctors of violating their “human rights” by opposing the strike.
Doctors resigned in February in protest of President Yun Seok-Yeol’s announcement of plans to increase the number of medical school students, saying it is essential to the future of South Korea’s health care system. The country has long suffered from a shortage of doctors in key fields, a problem exacerbated by medical students choosing more lucrative fields such as cosmetology over important but economically unviable specialties such as pediatrics. It’s getting worse. With South Korea’s record birth rate the lowest in the world, doctors are fleeing the field, leaving parents with few options to ensure their children’s health, and pediatrics facing a particularly worrying shortage. There is.
Professor Yoon said, “Increasing the admission capacity of medical schools by 2,000 students is the minimum necessary measure for the nation to fulfill its constitutional obligations.” Said In late February. According to the president, South Korea needs “approximately 10,000 more doctors to ensure an adequate number of doctors in areas with a shortage of medical professionals and to ensure fair access to medical services.” That’s what it means.
Yun’s plan would increase the number of medical students by 2,000 in 2025 and gradually expand the field, resulting in an additional 10,000 medical students in South Korea by 2035. Currently, Korean medical schools accept 3,000 students annually.
The Yun administration harshly criticized doctors for abandoning their jobs, and set a deadline of March 1 for those wishing to return to the profession. Since Friday, the Ministry of Health has warned that the doctors’ protests could face professional and potentially legal repercussions. But ahead of the deadline, government officials this week filed criminal charges against five National Association members for “violating health care law and obstruction of justice” for organizing, encouraging and maintaining the strike. The government has not released the names of those charged.
The police, who are conducting the investigation, Appeared On Friday, several KMA offices were searched for phones and other electronic devices belonging to individuals personally involved. The search followed an operation to seize the doctors’ home phones and computers, the newspaper said. Korea Herald.
The newspaper reported, “The ministry has filed a complaint against the emergency committee of a major medical association for allegedly violating the medical law, obstructing justice, and instigating and abetting the mass resignation of medical trainees.”
According to South Korea’s Ministry of Health, most doctors did not return to work on Friday. reportHe added that disciplinary action will certainly be taken against those who refuse to work, but that it will take time to process.
“The licenses will not be immediately suspended starting next Monday. They will be given advance notice and an opportunity to speak,” said Kim Chung-hwan, a Ministry of Health official. Said reporters. Since Friday is a public holiday in South Korea, Kim’s first day of suspension will be Monday.
As of Friday, an estimated 565 doctors among the more than 9,000 protesters had returned to work.Ministry said The doctors said they had called for talks with strike leaders to try to negotiate a way out of the situation, but they had not shown any concrete interest in doing so. Government officials also privately lobbied doctors to get Seoul to issue a return-to-work order, but many doctors reportedly refused. turned off Using their phones complicates the government’s attempts to contact them.
The Korean Medical Association issued a statement Friday criticizing the government’s attempts to save the country’s medical system from doctors, saying the Yoon administration is “suppressing freedom.”
“We strongly condemn the government’s move to suppress the freedom and human rights of doctors,” the Korean Medical Association said in a statement, according to South Korea’s Yonhap news agency. “We resist to achieve freedom and make our voices heard.”
