A considerable number of trainee doctors who walked off the job last year to protest the government’s health care reforms have returned to their posts.

The returnees, who resumed training Monday, are among the recruits selected for the second half of the year by training hospitals around the country.

Their return comes approximately 18 months after they left in February 2024 in protest of the Yoon Suk Yeol administration’s proposal to increase medical school admissions by two-thousand students.

While the exact number of returnees has yet to be disclosed, up to 80 percent of those at the so-called “big five” general hospitals in Seoul are believed to have returned.

The return rate outside the capital area, however, is believed to be between 50 and 60 percent.

There is also likely to be an imbalance in the number of trainees returning to different fields of medicine, with below-average rates observed in emergency medicine and pediatrics.