There will be more than 600 students graduating from medical-related programmes every year from this year to 2027, and there will be more than 800 internship places in public and private medical institutions for the new graduates every year, which will be sufficient for the next three years, Secretary for Social Affairs and Culture Wallis O Lam said on Friday.
O made the remarks during an oral interpellation plenary session on Friday in the legislature’s hemicycle, adding that the estimate was based on the internship situation in the past three years.
O added that if the internship places turned out to be not enough, the government’s public entities would provide some extra places for the internships, and with the government’s continuous effort in merging its procedures to expedite the qualifying examinations and internship arrangements for healthcare professionals, the internship programme for healthcare professionals this year would be able to start two to four months earlier than that of the previous batch.
According to O, the Peking Union Medical College Hospital (PUMCH) will start its recruitment process for different positions in view of the gradual introduction of more medical services at its facility in Macau, adding that the hospital expected the total number of staff members to reach 700 by the end of the year, of which about 390 will be medical staff.
O also said she did not rule out that the Peking Union Medical College Hospital (PUMCH) will send additional medical experts to Macau as appropriate.
O also noted that according to the government’s second five-year plan, Macau should reach a ratio of three doctors and 4.2 nurses per 1,000 population by 2025, pointing out that in 2023 Macau already had a ratio of 2.9 doctors and 4.4 nurses per 1,000 population.
