Thu 14th Dec, 2006
Med students’ debt exceeds first year salary
Research from the British Medical Association (BMA) has found that the average debt of a final year medical student now exceeds £21,000, reports the Guardian. This is £1,000 more than the basic annual salary of a junior doctor. The BMA’s survey of almost 2,000 medical students showed that average debt levels has risen from £20,963 last year to £21,755 this year, with new doctors earning £20,741 in their first year.
The research showed that 13 per cent of those surveyed owed more than £25,000, with 100 owing over £30,000 and one student reported as owing £53,000. Medical students study for longer than students on other degree courses and may have to buy specialist equipment. Some 90 per cent of the students surveyed had student loans, with 60 per cent also having an overdraft and 17 per cent having a bank loan. More than 60 per cent of those polled were also carrying a £1,000 credit card debt.
The BMA says that debt levels were likely to rise in the wake of university top up fees, adding that this might stop people from poorer backgrounds from training for the medical profession. The Guardian quotes Emily Rigby, of the BMA’s medical students committee, as saying: ‘The government has said it wants to increase the number of UK doctors and to widen participation in medicine. It will fail in both of these aims unless it takes action to tackle the significant financial pressures facing medical students. Becoming a doctor should be about your commitment to medicine and patient care, not the amount of money you are prepared to borrow.’