The health ministry came under fire on social media recently for its posting of a press release in which it made clarifications on the payment rates for on-call allowances of medical officers.

For readers unacquainted with the term, the health ministry has an after-hours ‘on-call’ system where medical officers and specialists are required to work from 5.00pm to 8.00am for 15 hours to ensure provision of services outside working hours in hospitals.

In primary care clinics (Klinik Kesihatan), some medical officers or specialists also do ‘on-calls’ where they are required to work after hours, most usually from 5.00pm to 9.00pm.

In its press statement, the ministry clarified that the current rates for on-calls, which is RM220 for medical officers, did not translate to a rate of RM9.16 an hour (calculated by dividing RM220 by 24 hours), as alleged by various channels on social media.

Rather, the ministry contended, since on-calls were only from 5.00pm to 8.00am the subsequent day, the hourly rate should be calculated by dividing the RM220 by 15 hours, giving medical officers an hourly rate of RM14.77.

This higher rate of RM14.77 per hour, clarified the ministry, is the accurate figure that should be quoted when discussing on-call rates and not the RM9.16 per hour.

Furthermore, the ministry contends, the government is also paying these officers a monthly salary, and provides an example of the fictional Dr Ali, who as a UD52 specialist officer allegedly draws a salary of RM17,000, translating to a daily salary of RM576.63.

With an on-call allowance of R220 for an on-call, Dr Ali would receive RM826.63 per day. As such, the ministry justifies that its medical officers are being compensated on the principles of ‘parity’ and ‘rate for the job’ adequately.

However, here is why the ministry’s press statement was derided by social media users, including many of the ministry’s own serving staff.

First, despite the clarifications being made in terms of computations, an hourly rate of RM14.77 compared to an hourly rate of RM9.16 really does not translate to much difference in the real sense.

In addition, the ministry’s contention of the 15 hours on-call is only true of weekday on-calls, while on Saturdays and Sundays, medical officers do perform an ‘on-call’ for 24 hours; which does work up to an hourly rate of RM9.16.

To provide a measly comparison, most cleaning agencies today provide a cleaner at the rate of RM18 to RM20 per hour. While it seems absurd to compare the hourly rates of a cleaner with that of a medical officer who is often tasked with performing life-or-death procedures over a period of time with limited support and assistance, this is unfortunately the reality in terms of head-to-head numbers.

Making this narrative worse is the gross misrepresentation of Dr Ali’s example provided in the ministry’s press statement.

The Public Services Department’s schedule for salaries for medical service personnel that was updated in 2016 shows that it would be almost impossible for a medical officer (who is categorised under the grading UD) with a grade 52 to earn a salary of RM17,000 as alleged. This makes the entire example inaccurate.

Many are commenting that this statement by the ministry is a ‘U-turn and an actual doubling down’ after the minister’s town-hall meeting with doctors earlier this year when this issue was raised.

The statement, some allege, is the ministry laying down the law to its serving staff that there is little to be provided in terms of looking at the ‘low’ rates for allowances,

The ministry has already been facing issues with allowances since earlier this year, when it was made public that there was a review of whether medical officers should continue to be paid a ‘critical’ allowance since there was a glut in the number of doctors.

This critical allowance was put in place for sectors which had human resource shortages, and has been in place since 1992.

It was provided based on four criteria:

•  the role and contribution of the service towards economic growth based on priority areas;
•  market supply of the needed human resources;
•  skills and qualification for the service;
•  occupational risk.

Despite allegations to the contrary, it is clear that the health service continues to be inadequately staffed; rather than overstaffed.

In fact, based on the assessment of skills and qualifications for the service, its importance in ensuring sustained economic growth is occurring by maintaining the health and productivity of the population; and the occupational risk born by health professionals in the line of their job – critical allowances are something that should continue to be in place for health professionals.

With little in the form of concrete relief in regard to serving public health professionals to date, the last thing the ministry should be doing is to further antagonise already upset, angry and demoralised public health staff who only recently were threatening to go on strike.

This is causing further anger, as well as attrition and high resignations amongst junior medical staff, many of whom are turning away from medicine altogether.

The vicious cycle of being ‘short staffed-being overworked-leaving job’ continues to worsen in many health facilities.

Someone has to take stock and fix this communications nightmare immediately, as the consequences will be quite immediate and clearly visible in the weeks to come.

Oh and by the way, could someone find this Dr Ali and ask him to put up his pay slip so we can see for ourselves if he is being paid RM17,000 a month?

The views expressed are those of the writer and do not necessarily reflect those of FMT.