Doctors Caught for Receiving Bribes
By Kim Rahn
Staff Reporter
More than 350 doctors were suspected to have received bribes from pharmaceutical firms in exchange for using certain X-ray-related products of the firms at their hospitals, according to the police Tuesday.
The products, known as contrast media, are used for enhancing the visibility of structures of fluids within the body for purposes of X-ray.
Among the total 357 doctors, the police booked 46, including a state-run hospital head, without physical detention, while reporting the others who allegedly received smaller bribes to the health authorities. Six officials from four foreign pharmaceutical firms were also booked on bribery charges.
The doctors worked at some 100 hospitals nationwide, and most of the nation's top-level university hospitals and national hospitals were included, police officials said.
They took 2.8 billion won from the firms between 2005 and 2007, as well as 2 billion won's worth of entertainment, such as plane tickets and golfing trips. Some even received things like paintings worth 10 million won or freezers, while a doctor forced a firm to pay the costs of his mother-in-law's birthday party, the police said.