Saturday, March 16, 2013

The GMOA are a self centered lot – with no appreciation for their fortune!


Yesterday I commented in my blog about the GMOA giving a solution to prevent foreign doctors from practicing in Sri Lanka on the grounds that they are bad for your health! And it is both costly and bad quality. I suggested they take steps to reduce the amount of medical practitioners leaving Sri Lanka permanently.
I attach a link today, where they are replying to the attack by the Minister of Health who asked them to serve their country that gives them a free education instead of going overseas. The nonsensical replies given by the GMOA in the link confirms my suspicions that they are neither representing their own, nor the interests of the country in their pronouncements.
After all we know that the doctors go overseas for post graduate study. That is fine, it has happened for a hundred years, so what of it if they return after a good training and an opportunity to work and earn some money overseas. I am not advocating stopping that. It is those who take the free education, then leave and do not return. They are the problem!
Then the GMOA says that Doctors work in far flung regions of the country. Yes, they got a free education, which if they paid they would have to fork out Rs10M to the country. So why not go all over the country to treat patients. That is what they are trained for after all! They then complain that their kids do not get the schools they want! That is just about the cake. Why should doctors’ kids be given any preference in State education? They can afford private education if need be.
Doctors have the best chance of earning a good living and sending their kids wherever they like. Just because they also want their kids to go to the best schools in Colombo, we cannot offer that over kids who live next door to the school.
They have had the best opportunity in life courtesy of a country that cannot afford their education, and they are saying that engineers and other professions also go overseas so why should they not. No one else’s education costs a fraction of the doctors so that is why they have more of an obligation.
Now that Sri Lanka will qualify 1000 doctors a year in the medical schools, both private and public, there will be more competition. There will also be less avenues for permanent settlement overseas. This will in future ease the pressure of the lack of doctors in the health care system.
I am told that the state sector will find it difficult next year to place all the doctors that qualify. So the problem of their employment will begin and the private sector will also absorb them, and their high and mighty attitude will take something of a beating when they cannot get jobs. 

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