Over 50 students who fled the war have asked the Department of Higher Education and Training and other bodies such as Universities South Africa , the Health Professions Council of South Africa and the South African Council of Medical Deans to help them.In the letter the students said:
“I lived in the beautiful city of Dnipro with my two young children. We had a relatively good life and had made many good friends. To fulfil my desire to become a doctor I literally left my job, sold everything, packed up my life and moved to Ukraine. So you can imagine how difficult it is that after all these sacrifices, one man decided to come and turn everything upside down.
Final-year student Luphumlo Ntengu said he had been scheduled to write the state licensing examination on 25 May but it was cancelled due to the war. “The second is to be in contact with the medical schools in Ukraine to receive programme details and student performance data. We are in the process of setting up a meeting with the Ambassador of Ukraine to facilitate this.