Help contract doctors have better futures

I REFER to the statement by the Academy of Medicine of Malaysia (AMM) recently regarding creating more permanent medical officer posts to satisfy demands for specialists (“Ensuring we have enough specialists”, The Star, Oct 22; online at bit.ly/star_specialists).

The plight of contract medical officers has been debated extensively over the last few years. Despite the efforts made by multiple agencies to ensure a better future for contract doctors, the matter has yet to come to a satisfactory conclusion.

The contract system was first introduced in December 2016. Since then all medical graduates have been employed under a contract with no clear disclosure of what the long-term plans are for these doctors.

To make matters worse, there is also a difference in civil service grades between UD41 contract medical officers (MOs) and UD44 permanent MOs, the consequences of which include a differential in annual salary of nearly RM8,000, and a lack of unrecorded child care leave and hazard leave for contract MOs in departments like radiology and psychiatry. All this despite having the same workload and responsibilities as their fellow permanently employed colleagues.