Materia Medica Malaysiana

Insinuation annoys MMC

The Malaysian Medical Council is irked by the Ukrainian Embassy's insinuation that a Ukrainian medical course was derecognised here due to lobbying by other medical schools.
“It is not true. We are not that easily swayed and the statement is uncalled for. We do not make decisions based on lobbying,'' MMC president Datuk Dr Ismail Merican said.
The embassy stated on Friday that it believed the increasing popularity of the university might have led to “inconvenience to other medical schools and their lobbyists represented in Malaysia.”
It also implied that there was “explicitly prejudiced approach” towards other Ukrainian universities which had applied for recognition from Malaysian authorities.
Dr Ismail said the decision was made based on a visit by a technical group and discussions by a technical committee made up of officers from the Higher Education Ministry, Public Services Department, Health Ministry and MMC.
He said similar criteria were used when assessing local and foreign medical programmes.
“Not even the oldest medical school which is at Universiti Malaya is given blanket approval. All medical schools are assessed between two to five years. We want to make sure there are high standards and quality medical education,” he said.
He said MMC's decision was based on facts and “there is no truth in the claims. To even suggest this is uncalled for.”
The council decided on Tuesday to withdraw the recognition, citing factors such as dubious entrance qualifications and medical graduates who faced difficulties using English jargon.