Cabinet lifts suspension of facilitation for medical interns

Kampala, Uganda | URN | The cabinet has passed a resolution to pay all medical interns deployed for training at different internship centers a total of sh1 million each, government revealed on Tuesday, a day after eight interns remanded while marching to parliament to demand pay were released on court bail.

The interns, according to Alioni Yorke Odria, the minister of state for national guidance, will be given a monthly pay from August to December, a development that comes after the majority of the 2417 deployed declined to report over allowances, among other concerns.

Health Minister Chris Baryomunsi told parliament today that cabinet has rescinded its earlier position that suspended the facilitation of medical interns, adding that the current lot of interns will receive their Shs1m allowance.

Grievances by interns started with a move by the government early this year towards erasing allowances for medical interns in a proposed National Education and Training for Health Policy. The policy seeks to reform health professional training in Uganda by improving the quality of health education and to strengthen the transition from classroom learning to professional practice.

The policy, which has been controversial, also proposed that medical students undertake an internship before graduation. However, speaking to journalists at the Uganda Media Center on Tuesday, Odria said this stand has also been cancelled and that students can graduate before going for an internship.

Responding to this development, Dr Joel Mirembe a former President of the Federation of Uganda Medical Interns (FUMI) said the new decisions taken by the cabinet are based on wrong information and cooked-up data, accusing Ministry of Health officials of cooking up statistics that a big number of interns had reported to training centres, yet it’s not true.

Mirembe said while the decision to pay interns irrespective of whether they were government or privately sponsored during medical school is welcome, it is nothing new and rhymes with the Uganda Medical Association’s demand of paying junior doctors four million shillings.

Last week, the association in which Mirembe is a top leader had issued a 14-day ultimatum asking government to pay all interns a uniform amount, threatening that the doctors would lay down their tools if interns’ demands are not put into consideration.

In light of the new decision, Mirembe says the association hold an extra -ordinary meeting to discuss whether to halt the ultimatum or not since their demands have largely not been attended to.

He says the problematic policy needs to be reviewed fully and views of stakeholders such as the association are considered.