There were mixed feelings on campus when the Health Ministry recently announced that Gozo has been chosen as the location for the prestigious new medical school to be set up in Malta by Queen Mary University of London.
Gozo University Group (GUG) welcomed the news enthusiastically. President Ryan Mercieca said government should undertake other initiatives to develop Gozo into an “educational hub”.
GUG are optimistic that having international and Maltese students studying in Gozo would counterbalance the number of Gozitan students studying in Malta and stimulate the Gozitan economy in sectors such as real estate and retail.
But the Malta Medical Students’ Association (MMSA), which represents students at the University’s medical school were less optimistic. President Robert Cachia said their main concern is that the new medical school may affect their learning experience which may already be compromised by the increasing number of students admitted to the medical course. This in turn may result in less proficient doctors.
There are also concerns as to whether requirements to enter the two medical schools would be different from each other and if this would affect the current entry requirement of the University’s medical school.
The MMSA said students at the University medical school are already facing a very limited number of Foundation Programme posts offered to newly-graduated doctors. Cachia said: “this year there were 100 posts offered to the class graduating in 2014. With the class graduating in 2019 currently having about 190 students, there is concern that a proportion of these students will not be offered a job in Malta.”
This may result in less proficient doctors
The association called on the Health Ministry to provide further information about how the agreement would impact students reading for a Doctor of Medicine and Surgery at the University.
Questions have also been raised whether any impact assessment was conducted before the agreement was signed, particularly whether the current health infrastructure is strong enough to support a new private medical school and whether the final qualifications would be different from those obtained by current medical students.
Julian Caruana is a 2nd year law student and media officer at Insite Malta.