Despite a shortage of doctors in many rural Australian communities, this year it is predicted that nearly 500 medical graduates from Australian medical schools will be unable to obtain an internship in Australia and therefore be unable to work as doctors in underserved Australian communities.

We urge you to commit to train the workforce needed to address the rural workforce shortage and provide for Australia’s population health needs by ensuring that, this year, there is an internship available for every medical graduate in Australia. Without ensuring this, these medical graduates will be unable to serve the community as doctors and forced to move overseas or work outside of medicine. This would represent a wasted investment in training future doctors and lost opportunity to address the needs of communities who have inadequate access to medical services.