Hong Kong patients’ rights activists take aim at medical establishment, back proposal to bring in foreign-trained doctors
- Heavyweights in medical sector had earlier urged the government to stop the health care system’s ‘bleeding’ by retaining more local doctors
- But patients’ rights advocate says Hong Kong has been left with an ‘anaemic situation’ despite efforts more than a decade ago to fix the problem
Hong Kong patients’ concern groups lashed out at members of the city’s medical establishment on Thursday by backing a government proposal to bring in foreign-trained doctors, saying the move would be like pumping fresh blood into an “anaemic” public health care system.
The comments were a rebuke of former leaders of the city’s Medical Association, who the day before had urged the government to stop the health care system’s “bleeding” by retaining more local doctors rather than “transfusing blood” by opening the door to foreign-educated ones.
“The government and the Hospital Authority tried to ‘stop the bleeding’ more than 10 years ago … but we are still left with an anaemic situation after such efforts,” patients’ rights advocate Tim Pang Hung-cheong said at an event organised by the Our Hong Kong Foundation think tank. “That’s why we need to ‘transfuse blood’ soon.”
The remarks were a thinly veiled jab at former Hospital Authority chairman Dr Leong Che-hung, who used the terms during an event on Wednesday when voicing his opposition to the government’s plan for adding an extra licensing option for doctors.
Earlier this month, health authorities revealed more details of a proposal for amending the law to set up a special scheme that would allow foreign-trained doctors from up to 100 recognised universities worldwide to be registered in the city without passing the local licensing exam.