Internship requirement for foreign doctors in Hong Kong is fair

Having seen Chris Jones' article ("Hurdles for foreign doctors reveal double standards", April 9), which was posted on the "Hong Kong medical licentiate exam" group on Facebook, I would like to give my two cents on this matter.
One year ago, I would have agreed with every single word in that article. Having gone through almost 10 months of my internship here, I have to say my perspective has changed.
Firstly, if you think hiring a few foreign, highly qualified specialists would drastically dissolve the workload of the local doctors, then take a step back and look at the bigger picture.
Because of the hierarchical structure of the system, the medical staff that the Hong Kong healthcare system needs most are the ones on the front line - nurses, junior doctors, interns and so on - as they are the ones doing most of the clinical work.
No disrespect to the consultants, but they have to deal with more administrative and management issues. So, from the local administrators' point of view, they couldn't give a flying fox about missing out on hiring those fully fledged specialists.
Secondly, the local doctors have been through one of the most brutal trainings in the world, and - no offence - these doctors deserve that specialist post more than any foreign graduate.
They rack up more hours than their foreign counterparts, with the same number of years of training under their belts.