Allegations of "Increasing National Medical Center Staff for Cho Min"... Ministry of Health and Welfare Says "Completely Untrue"

"Policy Quotas for Dermatology Residents Fully Allocated Before Jo's National Exam Pass"

[Image source=Yonhap News]

[Asia Economy Reporter Kim Ji-hee] The government has stated that the allegation that the Ministry of Health and Welfare increased the dermatology resident quota by one when Cho Min, the daughter of former Minister Cho Kuk, applied for an internship at the National Medical Center is "completely untrue."

On the 28th, a media outlet reported that "around the time Cho Min applied for an internship at the National Medical Center, the Ministry of Health and Welfare increased the dermatology resident quota by one."

Regarding this, the Ministry of Health and Welfare stated, "The policy quota for dermatology residents at the National Medical Center was finalized on November 26 of last year, before Cho Min passed the national medical licensing exam," and added, "The report that this was around the same time as Cho Min’s application to the National Medical Center is completely false."

They further explained, "The quota referred to as a ‘separate quota’ in the article is a ‘policy quota’ additionally allocated to public medical institutions, including private institutions such as regional emergency, trauma, cerebrovascular disease centers, and pediatric specialized emergency medical centers, to achieve policy objectives," and "Policy quotas are allocated only for the relevant year, are not continuously maintained, and are newly decided each year."

The Ministry continued, "Even if Cho Min passes the internship, she must undergo one year of internship training, and interns are not subject to specialty assignment," and emphasized, "The dermatology resident quota allocated this year is temporally unrelated to Cho Min’s choice of specialty, so there is absolutely no benefit from the policy quota allocation."

Regarding the criticism that the increase in quota, especially in the popular specialty of dermatology unrelated to public healthcare, is unprecedented, the Ministry said, "There is precedent for increasing the dermatology quota at the National Medical Center, such as in 2018, when the quota was additionally allocated based on policy needs," and explained, "The dermatology quota was allocated to enable the National Medical Center to perform public healthcare functions such as trauma, burn, and skin disease treatment."

Finally, the Ministry of Health and Welfare expressed regret over the report, stating, "We regret that the National Medical Center’s resident quota allocation, which supports joint response functions for COVID-19 patients in the metropolitan area, was reported with completely false content without accurate fact-checking. We will request a correction for the inaccurate information."

This content was produced with the assistance of AI translation services.