Doctors busy operating on a patient at Wuxi No.2 People's Hospital in Wuxi, East China's Jiangsu Province on August 9, 2018 Photo: VCG

 

A group of swindlers with only primary- or high-school education backgrounds were fined and given prison sentences ranging from 10 to 42 months for swindling Chinese doctors through ghostwriting their medical theses, Zhongjian Press reported recently.

A doctor surnamed Xiao paid a total of 12,400 yuan ($1,906) to the criminal gang and found his "thesis" published on a counterfeit academic journal in June 2020, which helped the police track down the crime chain of the fraud.

The criminal gang, with 11 members, under the cover of a culture company claimed that they could ghostwrite medical papers and publish theses in core journals where doctors in China have to publish a certain number of theses to get promotions or professional titles.

They successfully swindled over 300,000 yuan out of 17 medical personnel.

Each of these criminals had a clear division of responsibility with some responsible for collecting personal information of doctors from across the country and others counterfeiting academic journals.

They bought the hospital's personnel contact lists priced between 100 yuan and 500 yuan, and peddled their services to those doctors who attempted to get promoted through publishing theses.

When they received an order, they hired ghostwriters online. If the theses failed to be published, they fabricated theses acceptance notices.

Two of the criminals have only primary school education backgrounds; six with junior high and the other three with senior high.

Chinese internet users on China's Twitter-like Sina Weibo seemed divided about the issue, with some feeling sympathetic toward the doctors while others thought it was also their fault to become involved in academic fraud.

A netizen named Y Xiaomeng questioned why the doctors were forced to conduct academic researches. "How do they have time to cure patients?" asked the netizen.

Another named empempty commented that no matter what kind of profession, it is wrong to take a short cut and there is no excuse for academic fraud.

Global Times