<\/p>\n
You can also listen to this podcast on iono.fm here.<\/p>\n
JEREMY MAGGS: South Africa\u2019s medical school bottleneck is now so tight, I understand, that even top-performing matriculants are being forced to look offshore.<\/p>\n
Acceptance rates at leading local medical faculties are reported to be as low as 5%, with universities now in Cyprus and Germany offering English-medium medical degrees as a more realistic route for strong South African applicants.<\/p>\n
But I think this raises very difficult questions about access, about planning, about privilege, brain drain and whether, perhaps most importantly, the country is failing its future doctors before they even begin.<\/p>\n
It\u2019s a serious issue, and I want to talk about it with Brad Latilla-Campbell, who\u2019s country manager at Crimson Education, it\u2019s an admissions consultancy. Brad, a warm welcome to you.<\/p>\n
Let\u2019s start with this very blunt point then: is South Africa, in your opinion, turning away future doctors that it so desperately needs?<\/p>\n
BRAD LATILLA-CAMPBELL: Hi Jeremy, and thanks for having me on. Honestly, I don\u2019t know if we\u2019re turning away future doctors that we desperately need. However, as you\u2019ve noted, the number of positions available means that our medical programmes are one of the only programmes in our universities that can be considered competitive.<\/p>\n
Which means that in lots of other programmes, if you get enough points, if you get your APS (Admission Point Score) and you get enough points to get in, you\u2019ll get into that degree.<\/p>\n
But medicine is different. If you get enough points, you won\u2019t necessarily get in. They can only take, as you say, the top 5% or 6%.<\/p>\n
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Now that means a couple things. One, obviously, is that it\u2019s self-selecting for extremely academically strong students, people who are high achievers. But it does also mean that there\u2019s not enough space for people who are not getting 85%, 90% averages and seven or eight As across the board.<\/p>\n
So there are a lot of students who are passionate about medicine, passionate about becoming doctors and medical professionals who just don\u2019t have any space to get in.<\/p>\n
That\u2019s where we\u2019re seeing this bottleneck, is that if you are really passionate about this degree and about this career, you\u2019re losing out simply because of your high school marks, which isn\u2019t necessarily the best way to decide who is best for this job in the future.<\/p>\n
JEREMY MAGGS: So studying medicine overseas, as I understand it, used to be seen as a fallback. Do you think that perception, given what you\u2019ve just sketched out for me, has now changed completely?<\/p>\n
BRAD LATILLA-CAMPBELL: Yes and no, I would say. We still have obviously incredible medical degrees available in this country.<\/p>\n
I think that across the board, even the newer ones, with universities popping up with new medical degrees and programmes every year, they still have an extremely prestigious reputation.<\/p>\n
Loads of students and people across the country want to get into them because they produce such fantastic medical professionals, doctors, nurses and so on.<\/p>\n
But the reality is, we now have enough students who are capable of doing a medical degree that you can look overseas at getting those degrees at those universities that you mentioned, in Europe in particular, and then you can come back and practise here, which is a really cool option for a lot of students who are interested in studying or doing a medical degree but can\u2019t get in here.<\/p>\n
JEREMY MAGGS: But part of the problem is many of those might choose not to come back.<\/p>\n
BRAD LATILLA-CAMPBELL: Yes, and that\u2019s always a problem with studying overseas. But from what we\u2019ve seen, there is definitely a push, especially for people who are minded in the medical space to go into that, to help people, to provide for the community, to want to come back.<\/p>\n
They might take a year or two or three or four after graduation. It might take some time.<\/p>\n
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But lots of students who we\u2019ve worked with and who we\u2019ve seen choose to come back, and that\u2019s a little bit of a process in terms of recertifying yourself and doing the boards and things like that. But it\u2019s not obstructive necessarily in terms of difficulty, just maybe in terms of time and an administrative burden.<\/p>\n
JEREMY MAGGS: Ultimately, though, Brad, does it not come down to cost? It\u2019s a route that I would suggest is available mainly to families who can afford it, and the danger or the risk is that we are creating a two-tier system where wealthy students can go abroad and everybody else stays locked out.<\/p>\n
BRAD LATILLA-CAMPBELL: Yes, and that is also in general a problem that we see with students going overseas. But I think, to be frank, specifically in the medical space, I think that is addressed by us having such strong medical programmes available in South Africa.<\/p>\n
Listen\/read: SA\u2019s specialist crisis: Why junior doctors are taking unpaid roles<\/p>\n
This is specifically for students who maybe can\u2019t get into the programmes here. It is giving a second option, a secondary route to that medical profession that wouldn\u2019t necessarily be available here. Unfortunately, that probably is going to cost some money.<\/p>\n
But some schools, some programmes do have scholarship and bursary options available overseas, which students can take advantage of as well.<\/p>\n
JEREMY MAGGS: Do you think it\u2019s really about competitiveness and academic excellence, as you\u2019ve suggested, or simply a system in this country with too few places and not enough institutions?<\/p>\n
BRAD LATILLA-CAMPBELL: It\u2019s probably both. Depending on what you read on (X) and in the news, I think that having competitive programmes is probably healthy for any kind of industry or profession, especially in South Africa. We want to be taking the absolute best to do the hardest jobs.<\/p>\n
So when you look at \u2013 certainly when I was at school and I think a little bit now \u2013 if you look at something like actuarial science and how that\u2019s regarded by the majority of the population, that\u2019s regarded as something that\u2019s very difficult.<\/p>\n
But there\u2019s more than enough spots for the students who get those scores, because not everyone wants to do that. Now, medicine, there are lots of people who see that as a viable career option, a good, reputable career, prestigious career.<\/p>\n
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Read: Courts rule in favour of South African doctors trained abroad<\/p>\n
But the fact is that there\u2019s not enough spots, just as there\u2019s not enough spots at universities like Harvard University, Yale University, University of Oxford, University of Cambridge, necessarily to make sure that those programmes maintain that high level, there has to be some kind of cap on the numbers available.<\/p>\n
So creating that competitiveness ensures that students who want to go and who are going are aiming to get the very top marks, the very top qualifications out of high school, to keep up that high level of achievement.<\/p>\n
JEREMY MAGGS: You did allude to this briefly a little earlier, but the medical degrees that I referenced from places like Cyprus and Germany, in the eyes of South African regulators and employers, do they have 100% credibility, do you think?<\/p>\n
BRAD LATILLA-CAMPBELL: I think they do. I\u2019ve got anecdotal evidence of this in terms of people studying there and coming back to South Africa and working as doctors.<\/p>\n
So they do have the credibility, and I think that our programmes, in terms of our teaching capacity, is probably what caps our programmes, but in terms of numbers, we do have space for those doctors coming back.<\/p>\n
There is necessarily a kind of trade-off, you alluded to the brain drain, but there are students who are getting medical degrees in South Africa and leaving, which I think would probably be more of a brain-drain concern than students leaving to go and do a medical degree and perhaps staying there.<\/p>\n
Because now we\u2019ve used the university resources on educating someone who\u2019s not helping in South Africa. So there is that kind of trade like that and I think that\u2019s probably why those degrees are still respected and seen as good if you go overseas to get your medical degree.<\/p>\n
JEREMY MAGGS: Thank you very much indeed. In conversation there with Brad Latilla-Campbell, country manager at Crimson Education.<\/p>\n
#SAs #medical #school #bottleneck #pushes #students #overseas<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
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