Settle internship appointment issue before October 17, urges GMOA

COLOMBO: Setting a deadline till October 17 for the Health Ministry to settle the issue of internship appointments, the Government Medical Officers’ Association (GMOA) threatened that they will call an islandwide strike if the matter was not resolved soon.

Speaking a press conference at the GMOA office yesterday, GMOA Secretary Dr. Anuruddha Padeniya said they request the Health Ministry not to alter proportionate allocations of interns to the respective hospitals.

According to the GMOA while there are 64 vacancies at the Colombo National Hospital and 44 at the Kandy Base Hospital only 36 and 23 interns have been allocated to these hospitals while Jaffna which has 39 and Batticaloa 24 vacancies are allocated 39 and 27 interns.

He said the shortage of intern medical officers can be overcome by commencing internship for the next batch of interns awaiting appointments for six months. The GMOA pointed out that there are two batches of medical graduates awaiting appointments.

Meanwhile, Dr. W. A. S. Vipula representative, Doctors Awaiting Internship appointment 2000/2001 main batch said the internship appointments of the 2000/2001 batch based on the common merit list issued by the University Grants Commission and the Sri Lanka Medical Council was announced on September 20.

This list was made according to the applications made on August 13 2007 for vacancies announced by the Ministry.

This list of vacancies reflected a proportionate distribution of intern medical officers to all hospitals in Sri Lanka, he said.

Dr. Vipula said:” After the graduates applied for the vacancies on August 13 the Health Minister forwarded a proposal to appoint all graduates of the Jaffna Medical Faculty to the North and East irrespective of their merit position. However this action was opposed and following a Parliamentary Committee meeting, the Minister was compelled to withdraw this proposal.

In what seems like an act of revenge, the minister withdrew the list of appointments issued in September, and issued a new list of vacancies.

In this new list, there are a disproportionately large number of vacancies in the North and East. For example the National Hospital of Sri Lanka, the busiest hospital in the country will receive 36 interns, while the Jaffna Hospital will receive 39 interns. Batticaloa Hospital requires only 12 interns but they will receive 27 interns.”

“We feel this action by the minister is unjust. If there is a shortage of medical officers in the North and East this deficit can be filled by the 200 graduates of the 2000/2001 Repeat batch, who are also awaiting internship. This is the most feasible solution and would be fair for all parties concerned,” Dr. Vipula said in a release.

“We feel that our solution will overcome the intern shortage is not only the North and East, but in all areas in the country. It is unnecessary to complicate matters further by recalling for internship applications.

Therefore the most practical solution is to implement the current appointment list with slight amendments caused due to changing of merit position of few foreign graduates who are at the bottom of the list without cancelling the whole list of 745 doctors and to fill the remaining vacancies islandwide with the next batch of interns who have been waiting for more than six months.