The current Act prescribes that one of the grounds for disqualification of a medical personnel is being sentenced to imprisonment without prison labor or a heavier punishment due to violation of this Act or an Act on health and medical services without the execution of such sentence being completed, and also prescribes that, in case a person with a medical personnel license becomes subject to grounds for disqualification, his/her license shall be cancelled.

Recently, however, there have been criticisms regarding physicians who have been convicted of serious crimes such as causing medical accidents that result in a patient’s death, sexual crimes, etc., who nevertheless continue to hold physician’s licenses and treat patients. This has been possible because the current Act, unlike other professional license related Acts such as the Attorney-at-Law Act, the Certified Public Accountant Act, the Certified Tax Accountant Act, etc., did not prescribe that one of the grounds for disqualification of a medical personnel or cancellation of his/her license is being punished for a general crime.

Therefore, this proposal aims to strengthen the grounds for disqualification of medical personnel due to a criminal act from “being sentenced to imprisonment without prison labor or a heavier punishment for a health and medical services related crime” to “being sentenced to or receiving suspension of sentence for an imprisonment without prison labor or a heavier punishment for any crime” (Article 8, proposed).

Strengthen the grounds for disqualification of medical personnel due to a criminal act from “being sentenced to imprisonment without prison labor or a heavier punishment for a health and medical services related crime” to “being sentenced to or receiving suspension of sentence for an imprisonment without prison labor or a heavier punishment for any crime” (Article 8).