The letter from Ida Bakar Gomez saga proves doctors right in not returning is referred.

Somehow the comparison between government-sponsored medical students who do not return from abroad and Dr Edmund Terence Gomez doesn't quite fit.

In fact, the attempt to put the two in the same or similar categories is insulting to all the Gomezes of Malaysia. I'll try to enumerate some of the glaring differences:

1. Medical students are predominantly bumiputeras who go abroad to study under Malaysian government scholarships; Gomez does not have this privilege.

2. Medical students abroad owe the Malaysian government whereas the Malaysian government owes Gomez for his sacrifice.

3. Gomez is a prominent scholar; medical students are just that - students.

4. Gomez wants to serve Universiti Malaya and Malaysia wholeheartedly; medical students may not even return.

5. Government-sponsored medical students signed a contract promising to serve the Malaysian government, a contract some may break; Gomez wants to follow the rules.

6. Lastly, Gomez was offered a prestigious job abroad; medical students will have to look for one.

The argument that post-graduate medical students are staying abroad in order to become better doctors is not exactly true since one can always go back after serving the Malaysian public and get all the training one wants, with the consent of the government to boot.

Money shouldn't be the 'be all and end all' for doctors.