The National Health Department says it will announce implementation plans developed with provinces and Treasury to recruit more doctors amid concerns raised by the South African Medical Association Trade Union (Samatu) that 450 doctors who had completed their community service remain unemployed.
Samatu raised the alarm this week over the ongoing issue of unemployed doctors who had completed their community service.
“Samatu has documented a staggering 450 doctors who have completed their community service and remain unemployed. This number is still increasing.
“SAMATU has over the years engaged the National Department of Health (NDoH) to highlight the dire consequences that the department's lack of strategy in retaining doctors post community service has on the public health system of our country. Each year, successive Ministers of Health have acknowledged the gravity of this situation and the need to develop concrete strategies that would curb this issue from persisting. However, after so many years we are yet to see a plan from the NDoH which addresses this issue,” said Samatu general secretary, Dr Cedric Sihlangu.
By the middle of last year, some 800 doctors who completed statutory community service programmes were unemployed and struggling to find work in the public sector.
Sihlangu added: “The Department invests substantial resources during the two-year internship and one-year community service, aiming to develop these doctors into practitioners that will deliver the necessary yet lacking quality healthcare services to the remote communities. It is perplexing that the department, having made such considerable investments, neglects to nurture and retain these invaluable assets within the healthcare system.”
Samatu urged the Ministry of Health to urgently develop and implement a comprehensive strategy to employ these skilled doctors, ensuring that their “talents are not wasted but instead directed toward fortifying our healthcare system”.
The health department said it was aware of unemployed doctors who completed internship and community service.
“The department is aware of unemployed doctors who completed internship and community service and is working with provinces in consultation with Treasury to find a long lasting solution. The department is at (an) advance(d) stage to announce the implementation plans developed with provinces to recruit more doctors in the near future,” said national health department spokesperson Foster Mohale.
According to Mohale, of about 1800 candidates who had met the requirements to become independent doctors, it was not yet clear how many were unemployed as recruitment efforts were ongoing.
“It is difficult to tell how many of them are unemployed because the recruitment processes are at different at stages in provinces, secondly some of them may take decide to further their career to specialise. According to our records, about 1800 have met the requirements to become independent doctors. Once the doctors complete internship and community, they can apply for any open vacancy anywhere in the country, both in public and private sector.”
He said currently there were no vacant funded posts for doctors, but “efforts are being made to repurpose some of vacant funded posts in the fields where there’s sufficient posts to recruit doctors”.
“It is up to the doctors to choose their field once completed internship and community service, but our priority to keep or employ as many as possible especially for health facilities in underserved communities.”
Cape Times