The appointments will take effect from June, with advertisements for these posts to be made public next month.
Health minister Khairy Jamaluddin said the number will be made up of 3,586 medical officers, 300 dentists and 300 pharmacists.
He also said the Cabinet had agreed to open up 1,500 permanent positions for doctors every year from 2023 to 2025. In addition, 800 specialist posts and 70 dental specialist posts will be opened up every year from 2023.
“There will be a preliminary screening process and it will be transparent.
“If we don’t give them security of tenure, they will leave the service,” he said at a press conference today.
He said that the Cabinet had agreed to this at its Jan 19 meeting, adding that at least 8,686 additional permanent posts will now be opened to medical officers, dentists and pharmacists between now and 2025.
Khairy explained that the government implemented a human resource optimisation policy to control the size of the civil service and ensure prudent public spending in 2015, which then led to a stop in new permanent positions being offered.
Khairy said that 1,118 doctors, 1,019 dentists and 1,288 pharmacists were appointed to permanent posts from Dec 2016 to the end of last year to replace those who had retired.
On July 23 last year, the government announced that contract doctors, dentists and pharmacists will be offered a two-year contract of service and fully sponsored study leave to pursue specialisation – a last-minute offer aimed at appeasing contract doctors who were about to go on a strike.
The nationwide strike led by the Hartal Doktor Kontrak (HDK) group went ahead as planned on July 26, with thousands of them demanding a fair career path and the same benefits as medical officers in permanent positions.
Among these perks were being eligible for specialist training under the Hadiah Latihan Persekutuan (HLP) sponsorship scheme, which the health ministry approved last month.
The contract doctors can now apply for federal scholarships to pursue specialist training programmes in public universities while working – a perk previously only granted to those in permanent positions.
Apart from calling for a transparent criteria and selection process for contract doctors to be absorbed into permanent posts, HDK had also been pushing for contract doctors to have the same perks as permanent doctors, such as time-based promotion, hazard leave, cancer leave and other benefits.
Crucially, they also wanted permanent posts with Employees Provident Fund (EPF) for all contract doctors by amending the Pension Act.
Although he said he is still pushing for contract doctors to be granted equal leave and allowance as their permanent peers, Khairy today said he was hopeful the government will try to increase the number of annual appointments from the current 1,500 a year.
“The Cabinet and the prime minister care a lot about public healthcare.
“Though this solution hasn’t fully met the demand from contract doctors to be given permanent posts, we now have a new deal.”
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