"Overseas Aid In Reverse"

[irc]

A comment I read about the continuing failure of the UK to train enough doctors.

On the one hand we fund degrees in The Beatles.

https://www.google.com/url?q=https://www.liverpool...

On the other hand medical school places are restricted on cost grounds. Instead we poach trained doctors from elsewhere.
.

https://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/2021/08/09/failur...

[SpeckledJim]

'Importing' already trained and qualified doctors is extraordinarily good business for UK PLC isn't it?

[Electro1980]

irc said:

A comment I read about the continuing failure of the UK to train enough doctors.

On the one hand we fund degrees in The Beatles.

https://www.google.com/url?q=https://www.liverpool...

On the other hand medical school places are restricted on cost grounds. Instead we poach trained doctors from elsewhere.
.

https://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/2021/08/09/failur...

Humanities degrees make money for universities.
Medical degrees cost money.
What’s your point?

[Teddy Lop]

Telegraph article is paywalled, but isn't training to be a doctor - generally at considerable personal/family cost - seen as good way to gain entry to the UK?

Not disagrreeing that our end should be improved but calling it poaching seems to demean the individuals concerned.

[irc]

Electro1980 said:

Humanities degrees make money for universities.
Medical degrees cost money.
What’s your point?

My point is that we should train our own doctors not be a parasite on poorer countries.

We need doctors. We don't need Beatles graduates.

[randlemarcus]

irc said:

Electro1980 said:

Humanities degrees make money for universities.
Medical degrees cost money.
What’s your point?

My point is that we should train our own doctors not be a parasite on poorer countries.

We need doctors. We don't need Beatles graduates.

Fair enough. Do we happily accept that the new breed of UK doctors are the ones who didnt make the grade this year? After all, the old saw is what do you call the person who qualified last in their year? Doctor.

[anonymous-user]

irc said:

A comment I read about the continuing failure of the UK to train enough doctors.

On the one hand we fund degrees in The Beatles.

https://www.google.com/url?q=https://www.liverpool...

On the other hand medical school places are restricted on cost grounds. Instead we poach trained doctors from elsewhere.
.

https://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/2021/08/09/failur...

Is it really cost grounds? I thought a lot of it came from doctors having quite a strong trade union.

[Drumroll]

irc said:

My point is that we should train our own doctors not be a parasite in poorer countries.

We need doctors. We don't need Beatles graduates.

But doesn't a person's choice come into it? or do we have some scheme where only once all the medical degrees positions are filled up do we move onto Dentists, then engineering degrees etc?

[Sheepshanks]

MrMan001 said:

irc said:

A comment I read about the continuing failure of the UK to train enough doctors.

On the one hand we fund degrees in The Beatles.

https://www.google.com/url?q=https://www.liverpool...

On the other hand medical school places are restricted on cost grounds. Instead we poach trained doctors from elsewhere.
.

https://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/2021/08/09/failur...

Is it really cost grounds? I thought a lot of it came from doctors having quite a strong trade union.

I thought it was to do with being able to place them in hospitals for training.

[JagLover]

MrMan001 said:

Is it really cost grounds? I thought a lot of it came from doctors having quite a strong trade union.

Nursing courses have similarly long been restricted and are usually very oversubscribed.

So it has mainly just been short sighted cost cutting for decades at the cost to healthcare in many poorer countries as we siphon off their trained personnel.

Things have started to change recently I believe and long overdue.

[Electro1980]

irc said:

Electro1980 said:

Humanities degrees make money for universities.
Medical degrees cost money.
What’s your point?

My point is that we should train our own doctors not be a parasite on poorer countries.

We need doctors. We don't need Beatles graduates.

I don’t disagree with training more doctors. What I am questioning is the relevance of other degrees to this. More Beatles graduates = more money for a university = more money to invest in the more expensive courses (mostly science and engineering).

[irc]

Electro1980 said:

I don’t disagree with training more doctors. What I am questioning is the relevance of other degrees to this. More Beatles graduates = more money for a university = more money to invest in the more expensive courses (mostly science and engineering).

But that is looking at it from the point of view of the university. Every student who takes out a loan is a cost to the govt in the long term. As

"The Government expects that 25% of current full-time undergraduates who take out loans will repay them in full."

https://commonslibrary.parliament.uk/research-brie...

In fact from the point of view of UK PLC it may be better to have less humanities and more medical students. Higher cost now. Lower cost in the future as highly paid doctors are likely to fully repay their loans.

[randlemarcus]

Student loans are private finance,so we don't really care if they make enough profit based on the above model, or ridiculous ones, based on everyone being a doctor in the NHS. Though I suspect the NHS still wouldn't be "adequately funded" were that true.

[BobsPigeon]

Drumroll said:

irc said:

My point is that we should train our own doctors not be a parasite in poorer countries.

We need doctors. We don't need Beatles graduates.

But doesn't a person's choice come into it? or do we have some scheme where only once all the medical degrees positions are filled up do we move onto Dentists, then engineering degrees etc?

That's pretty much how Cuba do it and I suspect China too.

Personally I don't want my cardiothoracic surgeon whistling Octopuses Garden whilst he's cutting open my chest, but hey ho...

Stopping people who want to study medicine on grounds it's cheaper to import a doctor from India however is not a great look and its not great for India either.

I suspect the first hurdle to clear is retainig the doctors we have trained and employed in the NHS from going up the levels to Oz, NZ and Canada though (as far as I understand it.)

[irc]

randlemarcus said:

Student loans are private finance,so we don't really care if they make enough profit based on the above model, or ridiculous ones, based on everyone being a doctor in the NHS. Though I suspect the NHS still wouldn't be "adequately funded" were that true.

Student loans are not private. All student loans are govt debt which the govt is liable for if the student does not pay it back.

"We are a non-profit making government-owned organisation that administers loans and grants to students in colleges and universities in the UK."

https://www.gov.uk/government/organisations/studen...

So we should care about loans being paid back. It is govt short termism kicking an isssue down the road for a couple of decades.

So if we are taking out a mortgage to pay for students why not pay for skills we need?