Emergency room (ER) doctors are hoping for a turning point in the government-doctor conflict with the election of the Lee Jae Myung administration.

The emergency specialists want government officials to apologize for misguided healthcare policies that have led to medical disturbances. They also called for reducing the burden of lawsuits and criminal immunity to prevent emergency doctors from leaving the field.

“There was an expectation that there would be a solution after the presidential election, but there has been no concrete movement,” said Lee Hyung-min, president of the Korean Society of Emergency Medicine (KSEM), at the 2025 KSEM Congress at the Catholic University of Korea Seoul St. Mary's Hospital in Seoul on Sunday.

There is a concern that the burden will grow if the government-doctor conflict is not resolved quickly, Lee noted.

“It's hard to agree that the resigned doctors should apologize (to the public) for the conflict,” Lee said. "It's been a year and a half of misguided policies that have led to this situation because the medical community could not agree on the damage to the public. There's nothing wrong with admitting that the policies were misguided."

“The turning point in resolving the prolonged conflict is for government officials to admit that the policy direction was wrong,” he said. "Without that admission, (government proposals) are just technical fixes. Trainee doctors did not resign to work fewer hours. There's a change of government, but there's no rush yet."

More aggressive policies are needed to retain emergency physicians who are leaving the field due to the burden of litigation, Lee pointed out. According to the KSEM, 10 percent of emergency physicians have left the field since the Covid-19 pandemic.

"We recognize that mitigating legal risk requires social consensus. I want to put it on the table and discuss it until it is concluded," Lee said. “In the long run, for the health of the people, we need to reach a certain amount of mutual agreement."

Kim Jae-hyuk, a policy director at KSEM, said, "The biggest burden in treating severe emergency patients is the risk of litigation. If this is not resolved, it will inevitably lead to staff turnover in the long run. Physicians will inevitably avoid working in the emergency room or intensive care unit. I want to be able to receive legal protection when I have to perform essential treatments."

The KSEM adopted a statement calling for the dismantling of the Physicians' Collective Action Central Disaster Safety Task Force and the prosecution of those responsible for the misguided policy. It also called for activating a discussion group involving emergency medical professionals to resolve emergency medical issues.

Those in charge should politely apologize to the medical community and the public for the wrong policy, the statement said. The initial illegal forced resignation of doctors and their refusal to admit their mistakes until the end are the causes of the conflict that has led to today's situation. The (health and welfare) minister and vice minister who promised to take responsibility should be held accountable. They should apologize for the wrong policy implementation, it added.

“We have been demanding basic conditions to solve the emergency medical problem, such as resolving overcrowding in emergency rooms, improving infrastructure for final care and vulnerable areas, and immunity from judicial risk, but nothing has been resolved so far," it said. "Measures such as forced detention in emergency rooms cannot improve the emergency medical problem when basic conditions are not met. We call for forming a discussion group where the opinions of the field can be reflected in policy."