An empty classroom at a medical school in Gyeonggi Province is seen in this photo, March 5. Yonhap

Forty medical schools nationwide have applied for a combined 3,401 additional admission seats, a number that far exceeds the government's planned increase of 2,000 more slots, a government official said Tuesday.

The announcement came as the government collected requests from each medical school for an increase in allocated admission seats as part of its plan to hike the total nationwide medical school enrollment quota by 2,000 seats beginning next year.

The government plans to allocate 2,000 additional medical student slots to universities by late March.

"According to the education ministry's collection of requests for a medical school enrollment quota (per school), 40 universities applied for a total of 3,401 additional seats," Second Vice Health Minister Park Min-soo said.

The number significantly exceeds the 2,847 additional seats that medical schools nationwide said they wanted in a prior survey conducted last year.

Thirteen medical schools located in Seoul and the greater capital area applied for a combined increase of 930 slots, while 27 medical schools in the other areas applied for 2,471 slots in the latest application process, officials said.

The greater-than-anticipated quota applications by medical schools came despite calls by doctors to university presidents not to do so amid ongoing collective action by trainee doctors protesting the government plan. (Yonhap)