Two new medical schools on card

TWO NEW medical schools will be setting up campus in Barbados by yearend.

This has been revealed by Minister of Education Ronald Jones, who was leading off debate on the Caribbean Accreditation Authority Education In Medicine And other Health Professions (Incorporation) Bill, 2016, in the House of Assembly yesterday. Jones explained that the proposed bill would handle the accreditation of the medical universities.

Noting that the island already had one medical school – the American University of Barbados (AUB) – at Landsdown, Christ Church, Jones said a number of other islands had two or three, for a total of 31 offshore medical schools in the region.

He told the Lower Chamber the Barbados Government had “granted charter” to two more medical schools – the Queen’s University Medical School of Barbados, due to start this September, and the International School of Medicine of Barbados, scheduled for some time later.

He disclosed that another application, from the Washington School of Medicine of Barbados, was under consideration.

“It is argued in the United States alone, that in the next ten years we will need over 500 000 or 600 000 medical doctors and the medical schools in the United States do not carry the capacity to train that number of doctors over time to satisfy [that] market,” Jones said.

He went on to say the first cohort of about 200 students from the AUB would be graduating from its five-year course this year. (HLE)