Number of Recipients of Scholarships under Community Care Manpower Development Award

50 Assoc Prof Daniel Goh Pei Siong asked the Minister for Health how many students, mid-career switchers, community care sector staff and general practitioners respectively have received scholarships under the Community Care Manpower Development Award since its launch and whether the numbers have been hitting the targets.

Mr Gan Kim Yong: The Community Care Manpower Development Award (CCMDA) was launched in April 2017. It supports the community care sector in attracting new entrants, and developing in-service staff. A budget of about $12 million was set aside to support the programme up to 2020.

To date, we have committed close to $8 million under the CCMDA to support around 250 individuals to pursue training and skills upgrading opportunities in fields such as nursing, physiotherapy, occupational therapy and gerontology. Over 200 awardees are in-service staff, of whom about 10% are mid-career candidates. The other awardees comprise students and general practitioners.