From: queenslandpharmacyaustralia@gmail.com   
      
   On Thursday, 10 August 2023 at 20:33:00 UTC+1, davidp wrote:   
   > Countries Raid Each Others’ Health Systems in Global Battle for Nurses    
   > By Stuart Condie and Gabriele Steinhauser, Aug. 1, 2023, WSJ    
   > A global shortage of healthcare workers is setting off a bruising worldwide   
   battle for talent, as rich countries raid other nations’ medical systems for   
   staff to care for their aging populations.    
   >    
   > The competition has helped countries such as the U.S. and Australia replace   
   some nurses who quit in record numbers during the height of the Covid-19   
   pandemic. But it is also leaving hospitals in developing countries and some   
   wealthier nations such as    
   the U.K. worse off, as they lose staff to countries offering bigger paychecks.    
   >    
   > Australia has been one of the most aggressive poachers, with offers of   
   special bonuses and fast-tracked visas. An Australian advertising campaign in   
   the British Isles this past winter featured workers with sunshine streaming   
   through windows behind them.   
    The campaign coincided with British nurses going on strike over pay, long   
   hours and other concerns.    
   >    
   > “You can surf in the early mornings, go fly fishing on weekends, take   
   photography classes, write novels, or sell preserves at the farmers’   
   markets,” stated an ad in the British Medical Journal, an industry magazine,   
   for an emergency-medicine    
   registrar job.    
   >    
   > The health department in Australia’s Tasmania state, which placed the ad,   
   said that like other local authorities it is looking to many countries   
   including the U.K. for overseas workers.    
   >    
   > The battle is part of a global resurgence in migration that is reshaping the   
   world economy this year. As borders have reopened since the worst of the   
   pandemic, countries have been welcoming foreign workers in selected industries   
   to address labor    
   shortfalls, helping push migration to record levels.    
   >    
   > Douglas Chikobvu, a nurse at Gweru Provincial Hospital in Zimbabwe, said he   
   has watched about a dozen nurses from his surgical ward move to take jobs   
   abroad in recent years.    
   >    
   > Chikobvu, who is secretary-general of the Zimbabwe Professional Nurses   
   Union, said that in some hospitals one nurse sometimes ends up looking after   
   25 or 30 patients during a shift, instead of a more reasonable level of 10.   
   Doctors are being forced to    
   cancel procedures because they don’t have enough staff.    
   >    
   > Zimbabwe’s vice president, Constantino Chiwenga, who is also the health   
   minister, in April threatened that his country would pass a new law that would   
   criminalize the active recruitment of Zimbabwe’s healthcare workers.    
   >    
   > Data released by the U.K. government this year showed that the U.K. alone   
   issued 17,421 health- and care-worker visas to Zimbabwe nationals in the 12   
   months to March 31—almost six times as many as in the previous 12 months.    
   >    
   > Speaking at an event on human trafficking in April, Chiwenga referred to the   
   recruitment of developing-world medical staff as a “crime against   
   humanity.”    
   >    
   > “If people die in hospitals because there are no nurses and doctors—and   
   somebody who has been so irresponsible for not training their own nationals,   
   but wanting poor countries to train for them—it’s a crime that must be   
   taken seriously,” he    
   said.    
   >    
   > The World Health Organization in March this year published a list of 55   
   countries—37 of them in Africa—with the most pressing health-workforce   
   challenges. These countries on average have just 15 health workers per 10,000   
   people, compared with 148    
   per 10,000 in high-income countries.    
   >    
   > The WHO has asked its members not to actively recruit doctors and nurses   
   from these 55 nations without first sealing bilateral agreements to support   
   the countries where they are recruiting. Such support could include financing   
   the training of new staff    
   or plans for health workers to return to their country of origin after a   
   number of years.    
   >    
   > For wealthier countries, luring medical staff from abroad is attractive   
   because it can take years to train nurses and doctors. Between 2020 and 2021,   
   the U.S. lost more than 100,000 nurses, the largest decline on record, a study   
   in the journal Health    
   Affairs showed.    
   >    
   > Since the height of the pandemic, hospitals have struggled to rebuild normal   
   staffing levels and morale. Improved salaries and working conditions have   
   since drawn some workers back, but shortages remain.    
   >    
   > In Australia, the number of advertised vacancies for health professionals   
   more than doubled from early 2020 to August 2022 and remained close to that   
   historic peak nine months later, according to the most recent data from the   
   Australian Bureau of    
   Statistics.    
   >    
   > The country granted 4,950 visas to healthcare workers over the nine months   
   through March 2023, according to data from the Australian Department of Home   
   Affairs. That number is up 48% from a year earlier—yet the country is still   
   facing nursing    
   shortages, officials say.    
   >    
   > Ramsay Health Care, which owns more than 500 hospitals and clinics in   
   Australia and 10 other countries, recently said a lack of skilled workers   
   continues to limit its ability to treat patients. It is looking overseas for   
   staff, it said.    
   >    
   > Dr. Hardeep Kang, a sexual-health physician, was working in northern Britain   
   when she was approached by a recruitment agency to see whether she would be   
   interested in a move to Australia. She now works in Cairns, a city in northern   
   Australia known as a    
   gateway to the Great Barrier Reef, after migrating in November.    
   >    
   > Kang said she now earns about $56,000 more a year than in the U.K., in part   
   because of a supplement offered by the state government to sweeten roles   
   outside major cities. Her daily commute involves riding a bicycle along the   
   oceanfront.    
   >    
   > Rebekah Daly, a radiologist who moved to Australia in January from Ireland,   
   said that almost a quarter of her co-workers back home had quit to travel or   
   work overseas now that Covid-related travel restrictions had been lifted,   
   adding to the workload of    
   those left behind.    
   >    
      
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