Remove mandatory retirement' age for medical teachers: Dr Edmond Fernandes

Mangaluru, Jun 10: Dr Edmond Fernandes, CEO, Center for Health and Development [CHD-India] has written to Bhanu Pratap Sharma, Secretary, Health and Family Welfare, Government of India urging to remove mandatory retirement' age for medical teachers in private and Government medical colleges and Universities.

Considering the acute shortage of doctors in the country, which is way below the WHO recommended doctor patient ratio, he said the senior doctors will be instrumental to guide quality control needed by accreditation councils like NAAC, NABH and improve the overall development of health sector and human resources etc.

In the letter, Dr Edmond mentioned that employment should be seen as a human right which ensures independence, social security and promotes a sense of dignity and self-worth.

Setting a time-line for retirement at 70 is obsolete and unfair. The medical teachers post 70 should not aspire for posts of Heading departments and moving as examiners to other institutes, that should be clearly declared of in an undertaking and they should be assigned other development roles, he wrote.

He pointed out that a few medical teachers have dual MD degrees and a few might have Dual PHD's and it is important to cultivate these teachers without letting them go. If the mental faculty of the teacher is sound with physical movement at ease, there should be no retirement as such. Ontario Human Rights Commission, advocated and came up with the enlightened decision to remove mandatory retirement on 12th December, 2006, many other countries have followed suit. He has appealed to the Secretary to table this for immediate solution.

The letter has been copied to Dr Jayshree Mehta, President, Medical Council of India and Dr Shalini Rajneesh, Principal Secretary, Health and Family Welfare, Government of Karnataka.