Hundreds Of Medical Students Sign Up To Be On Frontline Of Coronavirus Pandemic

Hundreds of medical students in Victoria have signed up to a program to pull them onto the frontline of the coronavirus pandemic.

Despite not officially finishing university, loads of people are answering the call to ensure hospitals have staff available during the outbreak.

According to The Age, Melbourne University asked its 1,389 medical students if they wanted to be a part of the program and 1,388 replied 'yes'.

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The one person who didn't sign up apparently never looks at their emails, according to the university's head of medical education, Professor Steve Trumble.

This army of fast-tracked doctors would be able to help with coronavirus-related tasks like swabs and blood testing or they can be manned in the triage or telehealth consulting sectors.

These medical students could also be placed in non-coronavirus related areas to alleviate some of the pressure experienced in hospital departments.

Hundreds of medical students have already been put to work to help with contact tracing, which is the delicate and often arduous process of working through all the people a coronavirus patient might have come into contact with since being infected.

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Monash University will reportedly ask the same of its 850 final-year students soon.

One student from that university, Kevin Shi, 22, has already indicate he will sign up.

Speaking to The Age, Kevin said: "I think there's a big sense of responsibility towards our community. It's a very uncertain time for everyone, but ultimately we went into medicine and medical school to help our communities.

"Myself and many of my friends and colleagues are willing to help where it's safe and suitable."

Students are under no obligation to sign up to the program.

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They have their roles, supervision, insurance and payment, clearly defined in the contract they sign up to, meaning there should be no grey areas when it comes to looking after patients or doing jobs.

Hopefully this is a system rolled out across other states and territories that are experiencing large numbers of coronavirus patients.

Victoria has 821 cases of Covid-19, while New South Wales has 1,918.

Australia has recorded 4,247 cases nationally, with 226 people recovering and 18 deaths.

Topics: News, Coronavirus, Australia

Stewart Perrie

Stewart Perrie is a Trending Journalist at LADbible. His first job was as a newsreader and journalist at the award winning Sydney radio station, Macquarie Radio. He was solely responsible for the content broadcast on multiple stations across Australia when the MH17, Germanwings and AirAsia disasters unfolded. Stewart has covered the conflict in Syria for LADbible, interviewing a doctor on the front line, and has contributed to the hugely successful UOKM8 campaign.

@stewartperrie