I read with amazement the statement made by the health minister that he would be proposing to the cabinet to admit the 128 top scorers who were 'rejected' from pursuing the medical programme at public universities.

Even though I symphatise with the plight of these 128 candidates, I feel that the intervention suggested by the minister at this point is inappropriate. I believe that the cabinet should consult the deans of local medical schools before making any directives .

Though mathematically it is logically simple to say that by increasing their intake by just another 20 percent, the universities may solve this 'unlucky 128' problem , I believe that 'medically', this plan of management is malignant.

Admitting the unlucky 128 to the medical faculty at this stage would only cause more damage to the quality of our locally-trained doctors. I believe that the increase of five percent in intake to our local medical faculties this year was already planned with care as there are a lot of aspects to be considered .

Training 100 doctors per year at each university takes a lot of supervision and governance. The ratio of lecturers to staff must be optimised to ensure high-quality training. The staff must not be burdened with quantity because they are at the same time required to do research to increase the quality of the university. In situ decisions will only make the system crumble, and I fear worse.

Besides that, one has to respect the selection done by the higher education department. It was done carefully and the ones chosen met the criteria that was set and judged by merit.

Even in the UK, not all top scorers for the A-levels who aspire to become doctors attain places in medical schools. Becoming a doctor requires more than just having the best grades available. To discard and downgrade the matriculation candidates is unfair and only a reflection of one's inferiority.

I believe that the numbers of doctors that we train each year is sufficient for now. We have lots of qualified doctors around.

However it should be noted that the lack of doctors in Malaysia highlighted in the past is in the government service. The problem is not new and it is a fact that 300 doctors leave the government service per year.

Something has to be done fast to rectify this. A revamp of the national health system must be done to ensure that in the end Malaysians would be fairly treated and not discriminated against health-wise.