I am living in a country where strike is illegal: Korea. Not north, the SOUTH

  Sharing this for my foreign friends who may not be aware of the current situation in Korea:

We, Korean medical students, all decided to take our semester off to protest against the newly proposed medical policies by the Korean government. The government is now attempting to forcibly increase medical student admissions under the guise of 'supplying regional doctors and essential medical service providers (such as ER and CS) shortage', disregarding any potential impact on the quality of medical education and the economic supply and demand dynamics within hospitals.

The primary solution to this issue should be supporting local doctors and essential medical service providers, rather than simply increasing the number of medical students. Ultimately, the government is implementing these policies just as populist measures (because medical school is the most popular one in Korea). 

Additionally, they are currently implementing policies to easily revoke doctors' licenses through lawsuits and hold doctors responsible for compensating not only for medical accidents but even for patient' poor prognoses (without any fault). They claim that they can protect the doctors through the new policies, but there is never a realistic and effective policy of protecting doctors. Consequently, we are even more discouraged from pursuing specialties in 'essential medical services(필수과)' due to the heightened risk of litigation. We are certain that these policies will undermine the current medical system, so we earnestly seek to prevent this outcome. 

Currently, not only medical students but also medical specialists are collectively submitting resignations and going on strike to oppose this policy. However, the problem is that the government is notifying these doctors of license suspensions as administrative measures to condemn their collective actions. Is there any country in the world where the government order can override the human right to strike? Is this truly the land of democracy?

Please, raise awareness about the wrongdoings in South Korea. This goes beyond healthcare issues; it's a matter of human rights. Please, save both South Korea's healthcare and everyone within this flawed healthcare system.

Korea is maintaining a very low cost of medical care through the strenuous efforts of medical faculties, and these chronic issues MUST BE CORRECTED. 

If there is any advice or evidence to demonstrate that these policies will ultimately fail to achieve their intended goals, please help us in conveying this message to the government and persuading the citizens.

https://v.daum.net/v/20240219183029137

In this news, there is this paragraph:

복지부는 지난 6일 의대 증원 발표 이후 의협이 총파업 등 집단행동 조짐을 보이자 의료법 제59조에 의거해 집행부를 상대로 '집단행동 및 집단행동 교사 금지 명령'을 내렸다. 의료법 59조는 의료인이 정당한 사유 없이 진료를 중단하거나, 의료기관 개설자가 집단 휴업해 환자 진료에 막대한 지장을 초래하면 복지부 장관이나 지자체장이 의료인이나 의료기관 개설자에게 업무개시명령을 할 수 있게 규정했다. 명령을 위반할 경우 의료법에 따라 1년 이하 면허정지 또는 3년 이하 징역이나 3000만원 이하 벌금에 처할 수 있다.

and it means:

After the announcement of the medical school expansion on the 6th, the Ministry of Health and Welfare issued a "Prohibition Order on Collective Actions and Instructors of Collective Actions" against the executive branch based on Article 59 of the Medical Service Act, as the Korean Medical Association (KMA) showed signs of total strike and other collective actions. Article 59 of the Medical Service Act stipulates that if medical professionals discontinue treatment without justifiable reasons or if the operators of medical institutions collectively suspend operations causing significant disruptions to patient treatment, the Minister of Health and Welfare or the head of local government may issue an order for them to resume operations. Violation of this order may result in a license suspension for up to one year, imprisonment for up to three years, or a fine of up to 30 million Korean won according to the Medical Service Act.

all our endeavors to prevent and protect medical sites are being considered illegal.

In 2020, during the COVID-19 pandemic, there was a similar policy that led doctors to go on strike. At that time, most doctors either took leave and went on strike or worked at public health centers after the strike. However, these situations were hardly covered by the media, so the policy was still being introduced because no one other than doctors and medical students knew the situation. Since then, actual strikes began, and from that point on, the media and the government started to frame the doctors as greedy individuals who prioritize their own benefits over patients' lives. But WE ARE NOT.

please let people know the real situation occurring in Korea.

Real situations & informations about why Korean doctors on strike are Korean medical students are taking their semester off

 I am a medical student in Korea. We are not on strike or taking semester off for our own greed.... we are doing this to prevent the government ruining current medical system in Korea. a deep understanding of korean medical system and how hospitals here earn money is needed to get why we are doing protests

We call the doctors working in specialties like ER, pediatrics, GS and stuffs "필수과", literally meaning "vital specialties" and they are the ones who are working at a very low cost, in high risk of litigation, but chose the specialties just to save the patients in need. Most of the doctors now on strikes are them. It might sound quite contradictory, but if you slightly change your point of view, this also shows how much the policies the government suggest can ruin the medical system. We are protesting against two policies: one is about the number of admission of medical school, and the other is the policies called "필수의료패키지" (policies package for vital specialties). I personally think the latter one is a bigger problem. Most of the doctors and medical students, who are really working in the medical environment, are sure that these policies will ruin Korean medical systems. For example, there are two kinds of medical costs that hospitals can get in Korea, one is called "급여" and the other is called "비급여". The costs of medical practices held as "급여" are all decided by the government, and the cost is now IRRATIONALLY LOW so that if doctors give the medical practice, it becomes apparently deficit to the hospital. So they barely make up for the deficit by "비급여", of which the doctors can adjust the costs of medical services, or by donation given to the hospital. but the government is now trying to even regulate the costs of medical services provided as "비급여". Then, we cannot offer both services "급여" and "비급여", because neither can make up for the deficit or give sufficient amount of money to continuously run hospitals. Some media say Korean doctors earn like the biggest in the world, but that is never true. They should invest their life for 10 years to perform normal medical examination as a doctor, and regarding the cost of time and tuition fees, i am always feeling, as a medical student, this never is economically good way of earning money. Also, the hospitals are just barely maintaining current systems by volume sales at a low unit margin of profit, which is regulated by the government. That is why you can get a quick medical services in Korea, but cannot get sufficient time to exactly understand what surgery i am undergoing (explanation time before surgery, like in U.S.), because doctors are lack of time to explain all those things. I think this MUST BE CORRECTED for the patients, and the way of correcting this is by raising the payment of medical services that are regulated by the government. The "vital specialties" provides most of the services as "급여" form right now, and also, those services are full of risk of getting sued by their patients, so those are the reasons why many Korean medical students cannot dare to choose to get those specialties. The Korea media (especially KBS) is under the control of government, so they lose their neutral position, and most of the information provided by those Korean media are very limited. So normal citizens even in Korea are not well persuaded by doctors because we are lacking of media to convey our real messages. If you genuinely want to provide any REAL information about current MEDICAL situation, getting information through instagrams of medical students or doctors would be better, or if i can help a bit i am really willing to offer information over current situations in Korea. Though my English is bad, if you need any help from me, i will try my best to convey our messages. I genuinely, sincerely wish people do not misunderstand what we are wanting to show through our strikes, protests and semester off.

https://www.koreatimes.net/ArticleViewer/Article/157537

he, the one who is gagged, is a pediatrician, and that means he is in one of the "vital specialties". The "vital specialties" doctor was trying to say to the Korean president, that this policy package is wrong, and we want to communicate, but as you can see, this is the way of how the current Korean government deal with their opposers. The real doctors, in the real medical site, knows that this is wrong, and trying their best to let people know that this is wrong. But our attempts are continuously being blocked by the government. You should know this truth.

A Mock Kickstarter Project: Recycled Paper 3D Printer

LESSONS FROM EASTER

Have you ever heard of an island named ‘Easter’? Located in South Pacific, Easter island was once a very rich island which succeed in trading with other countries. However, one day, due to their religions, each of them started to build stone statues, which was called ‘moai’s. In order to build those ‘moai’s, the process of cutting down trees was essential. And since individualism rose, this moai-building growed into a competition between people, resulting in forest devastation.

We should never repeat the situation in this bigger island ‘Earth’ in the universe. And I suggest, the technology of recycling and reusing paper would be the best way to prevent forest devastation, which was unable to be stopped in Easter.

    CREATIVE CHANGE: 3D!

Recycling met the 3D printing technology! Through this paper 3D printer, the user can make a variety of recycled-paper-used goods. When the user supply reusable papers in the back and press ‘ready’ button, after disinfection process, the papers would be cut and made into gel, which makes it easy to be made into a product. Two modes are here. First, in the automatic mode, the user can choose the shape(cup, paper, etc.) and standardized size of the product, depending on what the user gonna make. On the other hand, in the self mode, the user would be offered 3D paper modeling program via our website, which can be decoded by codes given by system managers. And then the user can design his or her own product and print it through the paper 3D printer.

Create your own story with this amazing device!

20160529 Essay: An important skill to be successful

21th Century. It is the period when the collaboration of various ideas exists. People all over the world are now sharing their ideas and making them come true so as to be successful, and success which most people want to achieve gives you the feeling of happiness itself. And in these circumstances is one important skill you need to know: the polite refusal. It might sound contradictory, at the point that the word ‘polite’ and ‘refuse’ make you imagine quite distinct mood of pictures. Though, there clearly is a refusal method that the counterpart gets less hurt: The proportion of the ‘positive’ and ‘negative’ remarks is the key of it. You should say 5 positive things to cite a negative thing, in order to communicate appropriately, according to the love equation suggested by doctor Gottman. So, why is the polite refusal important?

First of all, it can relieve your feelings. Many of you, especially people who want to be kind to others, hesitate to refuse other’s suggestion because you are afraid of making them annoyed. However, unconditional acceptance can rather make others feel stuffy because they always have temporal and situational burden as the counterpart should decide all the things. Also, such the acceptance can contribute to uncomfortable situations to you since none of your opinion is included. For example, when you go to a restaurant for dinner, and you don’t suggest your idea of what to eat, the counterpart will choose your dish and it might not always fit your taste. But if you do not know how to refuse the counterpart’s order, you would not be satisfied. On the contrary, the polite refusal makes the counterpart understand the precise characteristics of you, which can offer a chance to communicate with each other.

Second, it is another way of expressing consideration. Altruism does not mean following others, at all. Saying our own thoughts so that you can participate in making a community’s opinion, which can be showed as a form of refusal, is an expression that you are paying attention to others.

There is an old saying “The proof of the pudding is in the eating.” We should all know the way to refuse well in social relationships to prevent unreasonable situations to happen to you. And it is now the chance to get your own beliefs.

20160626 Essay: Computer Games

Recently, IS, an Islam radicalism terror community, released a video promoting themselves. What was controversial about the video was that it compared a screen of a video game and a real IS soldier’s life, saying that “You can experience things in the game in reality.”

First of all, there can be a serious addiction to computer games. American Psychological Association concluded the game addiction was included into a kind of mental illnesses. They commented the symptoms of computer games was similar to those of gambling addictions, impulse control disorders. And this addiction appears due to the desire to be rewarded – Griffith, in his book <Online video gaming>, cited that addictions were radically based on certain rewards and reinforcement of thoughts - by something very simple for them to do in their life. Some proponents of computer games claim that there exists some policies, a shut-down policy in Korea for example, to keep people from being addicted to the games. However, one statistics conducted for adolescents about the proportion of game addict shows that there were no change after applying the policy, proving those policies have no practical effects.

Also, it can badly affect children’s mental conditions. According to a social learning theory suggested by Albert Bandura, children may observe and imitate the behavior the people around them do. And owing to this imitation mentality, children also copy the game contents they see. Since many of the computer games contain sensationalism and violence, such as some criminal incidents like murder and robbing, this kind of behavior confuse our society’s atmosphere. The most representative example of this is the Gangnam-yeok homicide case, of which the criminal committed cruel murders by the impact of violent computer games.

Lastly, computer games make people unresponsible for their job, especially for students to study less than they should. According to a statistics measured in one Korean middle school, students 20% from the bottom on performance usually appear to play game over 3 hours once they start it. Like this instance, computer games can have cons to studying students. But some people insist that there be some educational games. However, the market share of educational games is staying at low level. As a result, most computer games cannot be seen as having good aspects to studying.

In conclusion, I think computer games are not good for children on the grounds that they can have strong addictiveness, deteriorate children’s sentiments, and make children study less. Although games give us a little exciting feeling of life, we should control ourselves from falling out the world of provocative computer games.

20160807 Essay 5: INTERNET

“Knowledge is power.” Francis Bacon, the father of scientific methods of inquiry, said this, which means the more one knows, the more one will be able to control events. In this modernized world where computer remembers much information, the meaning of “knowledge” have been extended from just our brain’s memorization to what information our computer has, and the information-gathering and the information-filtering capability are being much stressed. Thus, in our life, a huge cluster of data of the past histories, known as BIG DATA and used to analyze social phenomena, is now interpreted as “power” of Bacon’s quote. For the reason, I think the Internet, the network connecting computers, provides people with a lot of valuable information, most of which has its own special meanings contributing to improving the usability of BIG DATA analytics.

First of all, that information can make the analysis much accurate. Some people might insist we are having too much information on the Internet so that it confuses the interpretation of social veins. However, the purpose of BIG DATA analytics initially is finding hidden patterns of the information. And in the process, having much information, though it seems useless, can work as an important resource of understanding this human society. For instance, social network analysis(SNA), one of the BIG DATA analytics that investigates social structures among networks, seeks influencers of the social network services who give others certain impacts through statistical tools like graphs and use them in marketings. And in this method, any information relevant to the influencer, if proper range of searching keyword is set, can be appreciated by its value making the outcome of the statistics more exact.

Second, having much information contributes to increasing the ability to regard something in diverse perspectives. There is a Korean proverb that “The more you know, the more you can see.” So having much information can expand the view on an object. Thomas Edison, for example, was able to invent a lamp since he knew about 1000 different ways that can cause failure, resulting in getting rid of the number of cases. And in the process, he could grow his own knowledge and eventually find how he can make a lamp work. Computers of 21th century, which we live in, can help us know ways to fail much easier than Edison’s era, by analyzing their own information effectively by calculating.

In conclusion, I think the Internet is now offering valuable information that can attribute to the accuracy of the analysing statistics and the diversity of information. The Internet would provide us a new way of life, by analysing and showing many views in the world.

20160828 Essay 4: Alone vs With Friends

“No man is an island, Entire of itself. Each is a piece of the continent, A part of the main.”, said the poem ‘for whom the bell tolls’ by John Donne. Like this sentence, we, human beings, are considered as social beings that interact with others to be mature. However, can humans find their values or meaning of existences only in social communication? The answer, on my own, is: Absolutely no. Although being with friends enables us to share our ideas with them and develop our ideas, we can think much deeply through a process called self-reflection; we recall our behaviors of the past and try to improve them to much rational aspects in the course. So I regard the self-reflection as more important thing to practise than interacting with others, so as to grow myself up.

First, spending time alone makes my feeling much stable. Some people might claim that our feelings are things to share with others so that we can be more comfortable, holding up a synonym “A Sorrow shared is half a trouble, but a joy that`s shared is a joy made double” as an example. But in this case also, we cannot get rid of concerns about the turbulence of human relationships. For instance, students often tend to evaluate others by their statements, and if there’s a bad estimation on someone, people usually spread the bad evaluation and gather to isolate the person so he would be lonely because of the evaluation and relationship. However, if being alone, we can retain our feelings much stably.

Second, investing time to myself enables self-improvement. Some insist that being with friends are more reasonable than being alone for it increases sociality. However, time for my own can also contribute to the society since I can reflect myself of the past calmly and know myself well to consider the ways to improve my actions. And in the procedure, our actions can be approached closer to the social ethics, which requires continuous self-criticizing, according to a philosophy professor Namsun Gang. Also, since each person gathers to make a society, and we interact with other members of society, having improved social ethics of myself would make for the entire society’s ethics to be better.

To conclude, I prefer to spend my time alone than with friends because it makes me be stable and give chances to improve more. Time never runs back: I hope we spend our time much efficiently which would be helpful to our life, by self-reflection and improvement.