For­mer pres­i­dent of the Med­ical Board, Dr Neil Singh, has called on Health Min­is­ter Dr Lack­ram Bo­doe and the Med­ical Board to take ac­tion against doc­tors en­gag­ing in ad­ver­tis­ing, warn­ing that the prac­tice could harm the pub­lic.

Speak­ing to Guardian Me­dia, Singh said: “This un­eth­i­cal be­hav­iour is ram­pant amongst our younger doc­tors. It’s for­bid­den and clear­ly ar­tic­u­lat­ed in our code of ethics for the prac­tice of med­i­cine. The cur­rent med­ical coun­cil seems tooth­less or clue­less when faced with this ap­palling be­hav­iour.”

He added, “Be­hav­iours such as these have the po­ten­tial to cause harm to the un­sus­pect­ing pub­lic. It is our du­ty first and fore­most to pro­tect the pub­lic by en­sur­ing the doc­tors we pro­duce are both com­pe­tent and car­ing.”

Asked what mea­sures had been tak­en un­der his lead­er­ship, Singh said: “I had the cur­rent pres­i­dent chair a com­mit­tee to re­view the pol­i­cy on ad­ver­tis­ing. This was al­most three years ago. To date, noth­ing has hap­pened. If we don’t ag­i­tate, noth­ing will get done. We owe it to the pub­lic to fix this mess.”

Singh al­so urged the Health Min­is­ter to strength­en over­sight. “The Min­istry of Health needs to un­der­stand that med­ical reg­u­la­tion is a dis­ci­pline in med­i­cine. The mem­bers of the coun­cil whom he ap­points must be trained and will­ing to per­form the du­ties of a med­ical reg­u­la­tor. It’s not just about reg­is­ter­ing doc­tors to prac­tice, but al­so in­volves dis­ci­plin­ing er­rant doc­tors as well as set­ting poli­cies and pro­ce­dures to en­sure that doc­tors con­duct them­selves in a pro­fes­sion­al and eth­i­cal man­ner.”

He said po­lit­i­cal ap­pointees lacked the knowl­edge to en­force stan­dards and ac­cused the cur­rent coun­cil of dis­re­gard­ing prin­ci­ples of med­ical reg­u­la­tion.

A doc­tor, who re­quest­ed anonymi­ty, said the is­sue was be­ing dis­cussed with­in the pro­fes­sion, as ju­nior doc­tors with lit­tle ex­pe­ri­ence were mis­rep­re­sent­ing them­selves on so­cial me­dia.

The doc­tor called for clear guide­lines to be en­forced to re­strict med­ical ad­ver­tis­ing and self-pro­mo­tion that goes be­yond fac­tu­al pa­tient in­for­ma­tion, pro­hib­it the mis­rep­re­sen­ta­tion of spe­cial­ist qual­i­fi­ca­tions or out­comes in pub­lic fo­rums, and en­sure ac­count­abil­i­ty for doc­tors who use so­cial or news me­dia in ways that ex­ploit pub­lic trust.

“Med­i­cine must re­main a call­ing, not a mar­ket­place. Pa­tients de­serve care that is guid­ed by ethics, ev­i­dence, and com­pas­sion—not by the pur­suit of per­son­al brand-build­ing,” the doc­tor said. “If we fail to ad­dress this grow­ing is­sue, we risk al­low­ing so­cial me­dia al­go­rithms to be­come the ar­biters of med­ical cred­i­bil­i­ty, rather than years of train­ing, li­cen­sure, and pa­tient-cen­tred prac­tice.”

Guardian Me­dia reached out to Health Min­is­ter Dr Lack­ram Bo­doe for com­ment, who re­ferred ques­tions to cur­rent Board Pres­i­dent Dr Bor­ris Mo­hammed. Ques­tions were sent to Dr Mo­hammed, but a re­sponse is yet to be re­ceived.