Dippers be trippin'

Jack Layton rolled into Dal this morning to talk about health care with local med-students (and non-medstudents). The big announcement
was about expanding the number of seats available in medical schools, and in line with that increasing the funding available for students wishing to pursue studies in family medicine.

Here's the meat for students: "[The NDP] plan will forgive student loans for health care professionals who stay in family practice for ten years." In addition to this, the plan also commits to creating "50% more training spaces in Canada for doctors and nurses" as well as fixing the foreign credentials program to increase the number of foreign doctors.

Initially it appeared that the plan would forgive debt after graduates stayed in a program for 10 years, but when questioned by a reporter Mr. Layton seemed to do a double take and clarified that this funding would be made available up-front, when students graduated and began their carreers, putting a strange emphasis on the ability of the tax system to reclaim that money should they break their committment to family medicine.

The reason, Layton stated for rewarding students who stick with family medicine as a practise, was to ensure that their mountain of debt didn't lure them into specialist studies (and more debt) in order to pay off their original debt. He also mentioned that they based the idea for this program off of a conversation he and Alexa McDonough had with a group of med-students just last year.

I spoke with one of Layton's policy advisors after the announcement, and mentioned that we were concerned about how up-front affordability is a bigger concern for students thinking about med-school. Consider the fact that the average Nova Scotian student leaves their university degree with more debt than their counterparts in any other region of Northa America. A reward of student loan forgiveness 5 - 15 years down the road may not be that inticing after already accruing a mini-mortgage. Consider also the fact that many Med Students take debt of other forms, such as bank debt and lines of credit, which seem to be overlooked completely by this plan, as with the Green plan, and as with any plan that focuses solely on Canada Student Loan debt.

I'll have a video of the announcement to upload later in the day, stay tuned.