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Date : November 30, 2015
Defunct medical system revitalizes once unpopular majors
   http://www.dailynk.com/english/read.php?cataId=nk01500&num=13605 [750]
The collapse of North Koreas medical system and dysfunction at state-run hospitals has triggered a change in preference for majors at medical schools, with students now opting more for health inspection and pharmaceutical studies over medicine, Daily NK has learned. 

Health inspection and pharmacy colleges are the most popular among med-school applicants these days not only in Pyongyang but across the country, a source from South Pyongan Province told Daily NK in a telephone conversation. 

Daily NK crosschecked this with a source in North Pyongan Province. 

He added, Those were the two majors students who came from families with no power and connections would go to because they have no choice, but now, theyre considered majors with goods prospects and opportunities to collect bribes. 

Those who graduate with a degree in health inspection have a much better chance of becoming a quarantine officer at ports and border customs offices. Three years of that will make you rich, people often say, according to the source. This is because all exports and imports must go through quarantine, and those who run trade companies are eager to offer up bribes in dollars or goods to avoid unsavory run-ins with the quarantine officers. 

Another promising job would be with the local health and quarantine office located in each province, city, and county. Officers there are tasked with issuing quarantine certificates for train passengers to ensure they are not carrying infectious diseases. 

Most vendors on business and other people who need to travel find the process of acquiring a certificate very cumbersome and just pay bribes to get them instead, he explained. 

The opportunities do not stop there. The post of air pollution inspector at the health inspection office, which gives people the unique authority of overseeing pollution levels at foreign currency earning enterprises and local factories, also tops the list. 

[Source: Daily NK]

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