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| Almost one in 10 trainee pharmacists in Shaanxi cheated in their exams |
More than 2,000 pharmacists from Xi’an cheated in the national licensing test, state television reported on Sunday night.
The candidates wore earpieces through which answers to the test questions were transmitted via radio.
The scam earlier this month was uncovered when invigilators detected abnormal radio signals from an illegal frequency.
“It is the worst scandal over the past few years,” Du Fangshuai, the chief of Shaanxi testing authority, told state media. “We’ve caught 2,440 candidates in total at seven test centres. At one centre there were 700 candidates cheating at the test.”
The total number caught cheating accounted for almost one in 10 of the 25,000 candidates who sat the test in the province.
One of the pharmacists caught cheating told state media half of test takers at one exam centre were wearing the same earpiece. “I don’t know why but some were not caught,” he was quoted as saying.
Local police have arrested several people allegedly behind the scam and are continuing to investigate.
The scammers sent fake candidates to the test, who quickly left after finding out the questions. The organisers of the fraud then prepared the correct answers and transmitted them to the candidates, who had paid for the service.
They then transmitted correct answers back to the candidates who had paid for the service.
Candidates found cheating would be banned from taking any national licensing test for two years, Du told state media.
Pharmacists are in great demand in Shaanxi amid a shortage of qualified staff.
According to national regulations, pharmacies and medicine wholesale firms must hire at least one licensed pharmacist. Shaanxi has just 4,000 licensed pharmacists – not enough to staff 8,500 pharmacies and medicine wholesale firms across the province.
But the licensing test, consisting of seven separate two-and-a-half hour exams, remains highly competitive. Candidates are required to pass all seven subject tests within two years, or their grades will expire.
...culled from scmp
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