The Indian Medical Association (IMA), the largest represented organisation of doctors of modern system of medicine in the country, has expressed its displeasure over what it calls as the “cherry-picking” of physicians from India to fill the gaps in the National Health Service (NHS) of the United Kingdom, without offering anything substantial in return to the medical fraternity here.
The Association, referring to reports, said that the NHS is currently facing a critical shortage of medical professionals (senior medical consultants and specialists). This has prompted the introduction of this new programme, which seeks to address the shortfall by recruiting a substantial cohort of 2,000 doctors from India.
While the announcement has sparked interest among Indian medical professionals, the IMA called it brain drain and noted that India too needs its specialists and those in real need of employment and better career prospects are actually the MBBS graduates.
“The cohort which the U.K. is seeking to employ are needed here in India as well, besides in many cases are much better paid here. The opening we want is for our MBBS graduates. The NHS has got gaps and we are ready to help them if they help us,” the IMA national president R.V. Asokan told The Hindu on Saturday.
Stating that the Association can’t support the migration of skilled doctors as it could undermine the Indian healthcare system he said that IMA is actively looking at setting up a portal for providing employment opportunities to young doctors.
“This will be a subscription-based programme which will give them opportunities both nationally and internationally. We are also looking at using the help of a commercial partner to ensure that our graduates get the best possible platform,” he said.
The IMA also maintained that the rate at which new medical colleges are opening will only add to the unemployment rate of graduates.
“We currently have over a lakh graduates passing out from the 706-odd colleges across India. We are seeing them struggle to get into a post graduate programme or get good employment opportunities. This situation has to change,” Dr. Ashokan said.
Meanwhile, the NHS, U.K.’s publicly funded health care system, noted that it will conduct training for the first batch of doctors. The current shortage allegedly is due to a combination of heavy workload and low wages. Currently, 25-30% of the NHS’ medical workforce consists of doctors trained overseas.
