What happened: On Feb 17, Dawn reported that for the first time in the country’s history, more than 28% of public and private medical and dentistry colleges could not be filled this year, totaling 5,873 seats. Details: The Pakistan Medical Commission has established a policy to fill the vacant seats for the 2021-22 session in light of this situation which directed the colleges that did not upload their names of admitted students to do so by Feb 18 as PMC plans to give vacant seats to eligible students. In order to guarantee that all admissions are completed by Feb 28, one-time placements will be granted only on the basis of merit. The stats: According to a document obtained by Dawn, 1,566 seats in Sindh, 1,331 seats in Punjab, 72 seats in Balochistan, 58 seats in Islamabad, and 51 seats in Azad Jammu and Kashmir were known to be vacant.