THE HAGUE, 06/09/00 - The Christian democrats (CDA) are hopeful that a new offensive aimed at abolishing the limit to the number of medical students will be successful. The party wants the Cabinet to state its position on this before Princes Day.

The CDA has been appealing for the discontinuance of the limit for some time, but the Cabinet and the purple coalition continued to oppose this. However, MP Buijs (CDA) has understood from both Labour (PvdA) parliamentary leader Ad Melkert and Health Minister Els Borst (D66) that they are in favor of lifting the 'numerus fixus', as it is called.

The number of students admitted to study medicine over the years has frequently been raised, but Buijs regards this as a stopgap measure. "If extra students start now, it will be at least nine years before there are extra doctors. "

A spokesman for Education Minister Loek Hermans noted that the abolition of the numerus fixus would be costly, as medicine is an expensive course. One option would be to allow the universities to introduce their own limit once their courses are full, he said.