President of South Korea meets doctors in an effort to put an end to their strike

The South Korean President Yoon Suk Yeol engaged in discussions with the leader of a strike comprised of numerous junior doctors and expressed the government’s openness to considering their proposal for a significant expansion of medical school admissions.

The meeting was the first one to happen after 90% of the country’s 13,000 trainee doctors stopped working in February, causing problems in hospitals. But there was still no news of progress right after the meeting.

On Monday, Yoon talked on TV for a long time and explained why he wants to add 2,000 new medical students every year. Right now, there’s a limit of 3,058 students. However, he said his government is willing to talk if doctors come up with a plan that gives good reasons for their request for a smaller increase in the number of students.

Yoon met with Park Dan, who is in charge of a committee for young doctors in Korea, for over two hours on Thursday. Yoon’s office said that the president promised to listen to the opinions of young doctors in future discussions about medical reform, including adding more doctors.

It wasn’t clear if the government will talk to the doctors soon and if Yoon is okay with reducing the number of students admitted to the medical school. The people on strike asked the government to cancel the plan to increase admissions for 2,000 more students.

Park wrote a short message on Facebook after the meeting. She said that the medical service in Korea doesn’t have a good future. But she didn’t explain why. Park did not answer the phone when called multiple times. Another player, Ryu Ok Hada, said that Park met with Yoon without permission from the other players.

During the meeting, Yoon listened to Park’s ideas about issues with South Korea’s medical system. They also talked about how to make things better for interns and medical residents. Yoon’s office shared this in a statement.

Yoon says the number of students needs to increase by 2,000 students because South Korea has many old people and not enough doctors for the patients.

However, lots of doctors believe that universities can’t handle so many new students all at once, and it would eventually make the quality of the country’s medical services worse. Critics think that doctors in South Korea, who are among the highest-paid professionals, are concerned that having more doctors would mean they would earn less money in the future.

Most people in South Korea are in favor of Yoon’s plan according to public surveys. Observers believe that regular people are getting more and more tired of the long fight between the government and doctors. The doctors’ strikes have led to many cancelled surgeries and other medical treatments at hospitals.

Yoon is getting a lot of pressure from people, even from his own party, to give in because his party’s candidates are having a hard time competing with their liberal rivals in the upcoming April 10 parliamentary elections.

The doctors who went on strike may have their medical licenses taken away because they didn’t go back to work when the government said they had to in February. Government people have said many times that they might make the punishment less if the strikers go back to work at their hospitals on their own.

The doctors who are on strike are only a small part of all the doctors in South Korea, which is estimated to be around 115,000 to 140,000. However, in some big hospitals, they make up around 30 to 40 percent of the doctors. They help the main doctors and department heads during surgeries and other treatments, while also learning from them.