Pharmacy School Course to be Extended to 6 Years

Students attending pharmacy schools will be required to study 6 years instead of 4 beginning 2005.

The Committee for Pharmaceutical System Reform and Health Industry Development, an advisory organization working for the office of President, said on September 22 that it proposed a plan to extend the current 4-years pharmacy school course to six years, and it would vote on the proposal at a general meeting set for next month.

The committee is set to form a taskforce team by March next year once the proposal gets a go-ahead at the meeting. It plans to start introducing the new system in 2005 and complete it by 2007.

The plan is aimed to foster highly-educated human resources in the field of clinical medicines by offering young students broader opportunities to study new medicines and pharmaceutical science.

The ambitious scheme, which has long been sought by the pharmacy industry, has been stalled due to lack of preparations at academic institutions and opposition by the herbal medicine industry.

"Aimed to reform the current system, a subcommittee has studied this case for years, and most of participants agreed on the extension to 6 years at a public hearing on September 18," the committee explained.

Sang-Keun Song songmoon@donga.com