The Independent Uganda: You get the Truth we Pay the Price
Over 1000 medical students have dragged the Minister of Health Dr Ruth Aceng and the Attorney General to the High Court, challenging the new internship policy that restricts them from accessing supervised practical training at various internship training centers.
The new policy seeks to reduce the number of medical students who will be admitted on the ministry’s internship programme and to vary the terms and conditions of service for an intern.
The drastic reversal of the automatic internship policy was announced on 7th/ September 2016, by the Minister of Health while appearing before the Parliamentary Committee on Health, to explain why there had been unusual delay in posting the applicants and other graduates to the various internship/training centers countrywide.
The group that has gone to court consists of prospective medical doctors, dental surgeons, pharmacists and nurses who ought to have been posted by the ministry of health in August 2016, to various internship centers country wide to commence supervised practical training.
They want court in Kampal to quash the said new policy and instead order for an arrangement that will ensure that they are posted to supervised practical training and paid the same emoluments as the former interns.
They argued that to do internship in a supervised practical training centre, is because it is a prerequisite for registration, enrollment, certification and licensure of a qualified and recognized health professional.
