Malaysia needs more than 40,000 PPPs by 2025

PUTRAJAYA: Malaysia needs a total of 44,804 assistant medical officers (PPP) by 2025 taking into account the country's expected population of 36 million that year, said Deputy Health Minister Lukanisman Awang Sauni.

Currently, he said, there were 23,329 assistant medical officers in the country, with a ratio of 1:1,400 population.

"The shortage of assistant medical officers causes an increase in workload, as they have to work overtime and indirectly, it can affect the quality of health service delivery," he said when opening the Medical Assistant Day 2023 at the Ministry of Health (MOH) here today.

Lukanisman said the number of medical assistants with degree qualifications was still small, which is less than 10 percent.

The ministry is targeting 75 percent of them to have a degree by 2030, he added.

According to him, several engagement sessions had been held with several public and private universities to provide degree study programme for medical assistants.

Currently, Universiti Kebangsaan Malaysia (UKM), Universiti Sultan Zainal Abidin and Malaysia Open University have special degree-level programmes for medical assistants.

Meanwhile, Lukanisman said Malaysia will host the 'The Global Association of Clinical Officers and Physician Associates' conference in Putrajaya in June.

-- BERNAMA