"Ideally one doctor can serve 2,500 people."Jakarta (ANTARA News) - Indonesia is still lacking of general practitioners to serve the growing number of population in the country, Vice Minister of Health Ali Ghufron Mukti said here on Wednesday.
"Ideally one doctor can serve 2,500 people. Judging from the number of Indonesians today that reach 240 million people, we need 12,731 more general practitioners," he said.
The vice health minister noted that there are 72 medical faculties in Indonesia that can produce an average of 5,000 to 6,000 graduates per year. Such number is expected to fulfill the need for doctors in the country in the next years.
Earlier a member of House of Representatives Ribka Tjiptaning called on the government to ease off medical faculty students in obtaining permit for practice.
"Students often find it hard to obtain permit because they need to go through series of competence tests that cost a lot of money and time," she said.
(Reporting by Rangga Pandu Asmara Jingga; translating and editing by Amie Fenia Arimbi)
Editor: Priyambodo RH
Copyright © ANTARA 2013
