Ministry pulls out all stops to relieve shortage of doctors

Star: SEGAMAT: The Health Ministry has formed a committee to look into the dire shortage of doctors and specialists nationwide.
Chaired by minister Datuk Seri Liow Tiong Lai and other high-ranking officials such as the ministry’s secretary-general, the committee would resolve the shortage with measures such as hiring 700 contract doctors, recruiting retired doctors or perhaps even foreign ones.
There were only 15,000 doctors in the country, of which 2,500 were specialists, Liow told reporters after visiting Segamat Hospital yesterday.
Liow said the committee was also planning to use specialists from the private sector to relieve the shortage in government hospitals.
“We hope that specialists from private hospitals or clinics could volunteer their services in order to assist the ministry.
“We are working out a mechanism to make it easier for them to help us,” he said.
He cited the example of Segamat Hospital which was supposed to be a specialist hospital but only had one specialist working under contract.
“The situation is dire and the ministry will act soon to solve the problem,” he said.