NEET postponed; final year students to be on COVID duty

PMO takes key decisions to ease workload of doctors

NEW DELHI: Seeking to augment human resources deployed in fighting COVID-19, Prime Minister Narendra Modi has approved a number of measures, including postponing the NEET-PG for at least four months to make a large number of qualified doctors available for pandemic duty and pressing into service medical interns.

The PMO said in a statement on Monday that the services of final year MBBS students can also be utilised for providing services like tele-consultation and monitoring of mild COVID cases after due orientation under the faculty’s supervision.

Medical interns will work under the supervision of their faculty.

This will reduce the workload on the existing doctors engaged in COVID duty and boost the efforts of triaging, it said. It added that B.Sc. or GNM qualified nurses may be utilised in full-time COVID nursing duties under the supervision of senior doctors and nurses.

Those providing services in COVID management will be given priority in forthcoming regular government recruitments after they complete a minimum of 100 days of duty, the PMO said.

The medical students and professionals to be engaged in COVID related work will be suitably vaccinated, it said. All such professionals who sign up for minimum 100 days of duty and complete it successfully will also be given the Prime Minister’s Distinguished COVID National Service Samman from the government of India.

They will also be covered under the government’s insurance scheme for health workers engaged in fighting COVID-19. The statement said the National Eligibility cum Entrance Test for Post-Graduation (NEET-PG) will be postponed for at least four months, and the exam will not be held before August 31.