Graduate medical students in Kenya have taken to the streets to protest against prolonged delays in their postings as medical and dental interns and pharmacists.
The graduates on Monday, February 12, 2024, staged the demonstrations outside the Ministry of Health Headquarters at Afya House, Nairobi.
Dressed in white laboratory coats and medical hair nets, the students marched in solidarity from around 10 am to Afya Hosue in Nairobi.
They carried posters that had written messages to the ministry.
“It’s the patients who suffer, post interns,”; “Na badoooo.. post interns.”
According to the Kenya Medical Practitioners and Dentists Council (KMPDC), medical and dental students, upon graduation, must embark on a 13-month-long internship program.
The procedure for posting interns is detailed in the National Guidelines for Internship Training of Medical and Dental Officer Interns (2019).
“Interns shall be posted within a month upon successful completion of their training and passing of the final examination, graduation notwithstanding, or passing of the Council’s Internship Qualifying Exams,” the guidelines read in part.
The interns are also supposed to start receiving salaries two months after the commencement of the internship program.
It was reported that most of the graduate doctors finished their studies in July 2023, but no information was forthcoming from the Ministry of Education about their posting.
In December 2022, there was a similar standoff between graduate doctors and the national and county governments.
At the time, to avert a strike, CS Nakhumicha directed that all medical interns be posted in batches beginning January 2023.