In the battle of COVID-19, Foreign medical graduates with MBBS degrees from abroad still wait their turn

Delhi: With the increasing number of COVID cases in India, many foreign medical graduates have offered their services to the Centre asking the government to allow them permission to work as doctors without passing the mandatory Bridge exam amid the pandemic. However, the government seems to have still not responded to the offer by these graduates, even though many states are now scrambling to inculcate final year Indian MBBS students in the workforce

Foreign medicos under the banner of All India Foreign Medical Graduates Association have submitted a series of letters to the President, the Prime Minister, and the health Ministry of the country in March requesting them to grant FMGs licenses which will allow them to work as doctors and they will be able to contribute in the fight against COVID-19.

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The graduates who complete their MBBS from the countries like China, Ukraine, Bangladesh, Russia, and Nepal have to clear the foreign medical graduate exam conducted by MCI before getting a license of practising in India. The graduates from the US, UK, Australia, Canada, New Zealand do not need to sit for such an exam. In the current scenario when the health facilities of India and the health workers are under the constant pressure of providing Healthcare services, the foreign medical students have urged the government to give them a "one-time extension" from the exam so that they can contribute in the workforce of India.

Previously Medical dialogues team reported that the association said in their letter "This one step will add around 20,000 MBBS doctors and 1,000 specialists in the workforce against our fight with COVID19".

The letter addressed to the Prime Minister of India, the foreign medical graduate community stated "all of us have passed MBBS from WHO and MCI recognized colleges with acquiring more than 60% overall and each semester. We have respected the exam and have attended it, but these are exceptional times, we have knowledge and skill to work in Intensive Care emergency care. We are not getting in the discussion of the government's choice of training veterinary doctors to treat COVID-19. We request you to deploy us in this emergency by providing us with registration." But they are yet to get any official response to their letter.

All India foreign medical graduates Association has also submitted a letter to our honourable president, Shri Ram Nath Kovind Ji and stated that "there is war ahead and motherland India will not only require MBBS graduates but a plethora of postgraduate specialist in different field of medicine and surgery to effectively tackle this one in a lifetime situation. We should be preparing well in advance, hence this representation. There are a thousand of modern medicine trained foreign medical graduates of India who completed their medical education from abroad waiting for registration in the country, currently, this FMGs have to clear MCI screening test. On the other hand, the broad speciality postgraduates don't even have any provision of screening tests and are devoid of any opportunity of registering our Homeland."

The government, on the other hand, seems to be unsure about the proficiency of these FMGs."The government wants to maintain a certain standard which is why foreign medical graduates cannot be allowed to practice without the mandatory test. There is a reason why that test was introduced in the first place. And if you see, each year, more than 80 percent of these graduates are unable to pass the test, which means they are not fit to practice," a health ministry official, who did not wish to be named, told ThePrint.

Foreign Medical Students are continuing with the endeavour on requesting the authorities to not to treat them as outsiders. 

Several FMGs and MBBS medicos are venting their anger via social media platforms as they hold the view that instead of appointing final year Medicos or intern doctor FMGs will be a better option to deal with the COVID scenario in the country.