Busan, Kwangju doctors end strike

The government Thursday ordered striking interns and residents to return to work while an increasing number of doctors were ending their walkout.

The Busan Medical Association and Kwangju Medical Association declared ends to their strikes, while doctors operating clinics were increasingly returning to their jobs.

The government told the heads of 81 hospitals across the nation now training 12,000 interns and residents to take every necessary measure to get them back to work. The government order was made in a meeting between the hospital heads and the ministers of education, government administration and local autonomy, and health and welfare.

The government told the hospital authorities to take disciplinary measures against interns and residents who fail to comply with the order. Those who work at state-run and public hospitals will be punished first.

The punitive measures include not recognizing the training period, no pay for no work, and dismissal, according to a government spokesman. Heads of hospitals will have to inform the military conscription authorities of dismissals of interns or residents within two weeks after the measure is taken.

Conscription authorities will draft errant interns and residents as military doctors in February according to the enforcement decree of the Conscription Law.

Earlier, Inje Paik Hospital in Busan ordered interns and residents working at its four hospitals to return to work by Thursday. Meanwhile, the Korea Medical Association, even if it strongly protested the hawkish measure of the government, reportedly is preparing for talks with the government. The 10-man subcommittee of the Joint Emergency Committee has worked out the plans for negotiations, sources said.

Heads of hospitals nationwide had called for a solution through dialogue in a meeting arranged by the Korean Hospital Association.