Prague, May 15 (CTK) – The Czech faculties of medicines are to receive additional 6.5 billion crowns in ten years, while they should increase the number of their new students by 15 percent every year, Prime Minister Andrej Babis (ANO) said after a meeting with the faculties’ deans on Tuesday.
It was also attended by Health Minister Adam Vojtech (for ANO) and Education Minister Robert Plaga (ANO).
The government intends to allocate the first 135 million crowns to the faculties of medicine this September already, Babis said.
The planned rise in the number of medicine students is to ward off the threatening lack of doctors in the future.
“We are not able to compensate for the doctors who retire with the current number of graduates (from medicine faculties). In 2020, one-third of doctors will be over 60 and their share will be further rising,” Vojtech said.
Babis said some 6.5 billion should be allocated to the faculties of medicine in ten years, while the sum should gradually rise.
Plaga said the state would have to pay for more students of medicine in all study years and the faculties would admit 15 percent more students every year.
At present, only some 45 percent of those who successfully pass the entrance exams are admitted to medicine studies due to the faculties’ limited capacity.
Along with the increasing number of students, the salaries of their lecturers at the faculties of medicine must be raised, Vojtech said.
“The salaries of medicine lecturers amount to a half of what doctors in practice earn. This is why we must double them,” Vojtech added.
In the past academic year, more than 21,000 people studied at the faculties of medicine in the Czech Republic, while some 2,500 graduated from them.
The faculties admit one in 10 or 15 applicants for studies.
At present, they receive some two-thirds of the sum they need to secure high-quality studies, their deans said.
They gain the rest mainly from the foreigners who attend the paid English study programmes. Last year, the faculties registered about 3,400 foreign students, the deans added.
