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According to a BMA report, medical students from low-incomebackgrounds are graduating with over 13,000 more debt comparedto their better off fellow students. These perturbing findings havebeen discovered in the BMA's Medical Student Finance Survey(2010/2011), that questioned over 2,800 medical students. It raisesconcerns regarding the government's plans to widen access tomedicine from low-income groups. These are the report's key conclusions: The average debt for medical students at graduation has increasedfrom 23,909 to 24,092 but for graduates from lower incomebrackets the projected debt is 37,588, an increase of 11,264 from 26,324 in the past 12 months. Graduate students studying a first degree prior to studyingmedicine had a higher average debt of 30,748. Nearly all medical students (94%) in their final year reported sometype of debt in form of credit cards, overdrafts, student loans orother sources. Students from low income and graduate backgrounds tend to rely onhigher levels of commercial borrowing, i.e. credit cards andstudent bank loans. In the past year the number of medical students from a low-incomebackground has dropped from 14% to 11%. Nearly half (44%) of medical students depend on financialassistance from relatives and friends, averaging 3,702 a year. Elly Pilavachi, Co-Chair of the BMA's Medical Student Committee anda medical student from Brighton commented on the report saying: "Medical students are now facing extremely high levels ofgraduation debt. Many are clearly heavily dependent on financialsupport from their families and friends to get through theintensive, five to six year medical course. However, the picture for those from low-income backgrounds isparticularly alarming with their debt levels a staggering 13,000 higher than those from higher income brackets. Ourevidence shows they are having to borrow more and are under morefinancial pressure than their peers. It is hardly surprising that there has been a noticeable andworrying drop in the number of students coming from less well-offbackgrounds. With the government intent on allowing universities to charge up to 9,000 a year in tuition fees from 2012 the picture for allmedical students looks bleak. Ministers are running the risk of restricting access to medicine tothose with the ability to pay rather than the talent to succeed. Assomeone from a modest background who is struggling under thecurrent fee regime I would have thought twice about going tomedical school if I had to cope with the predicted 70,000 worthof debt that many medical students could face under the new feeregime from next year." Graduate medical student Marion Matheson from Bristol, who isco-chair of the BMA Medical Student's Committee added: "Our research shows that graduate students, like myself, areincurring higher levels of debt, on average 6,000 more thanother students. This is deeply concerning as this important group make up asignificant part of the medical school population and are morelikely to come from low income backgrounds. Many bring valuableexperience and skills to the medical profession that benefitpatients, the NHS, clinical research and other disciplines. The BMA is continuing to press the government to outline acomprehensive widening access strategy that does more to helpaddress the financial plight of medical students, especially thosefrom low income and graduate backgrounds who are under significantfinancial pressure." Written by Petra Rattue Copyright: Medical News Today Not to be reproduced without permission of Medical News Today Additional References Citations. I am an expert from multifunction-calibrator.com, while we provides the quality product, such as Infrared Thermometer , Loop Calibrator, RTD Calibrator,and more.
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