The legislature’s Social Welfare and Environmental Hygiene Committee is scheduled to review a proposed amendment to the Physician’s Act (醫師法) on Wednesday that would oblige holders of foreign medical degrees to pass an examination and complete an internship before they can take the national examination for a medical license.
This will be the committee’s last meeting in the current legislative session.
Committee head Yang Li-huan (楊麗環) of the Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT) included the amendment to the agenda after the Federation of Medical Students in Taiwan launched a letter campaign to accelerate the legislature’s review of the amendment.
Federation president Chang Hung-hao (張恆豪) said yesterday that while the amendment was submitted to the legislature for review one year ago, the proposal has failed to be put on the committee agenda since then.
The federation initiated the campaign via Facebook last week, calling on the public to write to President Ma Ying-jeou (馬英九), Premier Wu Den-yih (吳敦義) and Department of Health (DOH) Minister Yaung Chih-liang (楊志良) to stop “East European medical degrees from overwhelming Taiwan.”
The federation launched a protest on May 31 last year after Taiwanese students at medical schools in Poland launched a campaign questioning the quality of medical education there.
The DOH proposed to amend the act by requiring that medical students graduating from medical schools abroad pass a qualification exam and complete an internship in Taiwan before they can take the national examination to obtain a medical license.
The proposal would also authorize the department to impose a ceiling on the number of holders of foreign medical diplomas allowed to participate in the internship every year.
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