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Worker exodus threatens health care systems
Bertha Shoko, The Standard (Zimbabwe)
April 10, 2006

http://www.thestandard.co.zw/viewinfo.cfm?linkid=11&id=499&siteid=1

THE continued loss of skilled health care workers to the developed world is a serious threat to health care systems in Zimbabwe and Africa and remains a challenge for the continent, health experts have said.

This was said on Friday as Zimbabwe joined the rest of the world in commemorating World Health Day. The World Health Organisation (WHO) dedicated the day to solving what it calls the "health workforce crisis".

And WHO must have had Zimbabwe in mind when it chose to focus on this problem.

In Zimbabwe, the brain drain problem has become such a huge crisis that the health delivery system is threatened with collapse.

The country’s health sector has deteriorated over the past few years due to inadequate funding, shortages of foreign currency and the departure of skilled health personnel to other countries offering better conditions of service.

The Minister of Health and Child Welfare, David Parirenyatwa, told The Standard that his ministry was taking the issue of brain drain seriously and his ministry had taken part in a regional meeting on World Health Day hosted by WHO on Friday in Zambia.

Parirenyatwa said: "The issue of brain drain is quite serious not only for Zimbabwe but for the rest of Africa. We will let you know soon the measures we have put in place to address this problem following this regional meeting."

WHO says health workers, defined as people who provide health care to those who need it, are the "heart of health systems".

However, the organisation says these health systems, especially in sub-Saharan Africa, are threatened by chronic shortages of health workers as a result of decades of "underinvestment in their education, training, salaries and working environment".

WHO says: "The health workforce is in crisis — a crisis to which no country is entirely immune.

This has led to a severe lack of key skills, rising levels of career switching and early retirement, as well as national and international migration.

"In sub-Saharan Africa, where all the issues mentioned above are combined with the HIV/Aids pandemic, there are an estimated 750 000 health workers in a region that is home to 682 million people.

By comparison, the ratio is 10 to 15 times higher in OECD countries, whose ageing population is putting a growing strain on an over-stretched workforce.

The WHO says solutions to this crisis need to be worked out at local, national and international levels and must involve governments, the United Nations, health professionals, non-governmental organizations and community leaders.

"There is no single solution to such a complex problem, but ways forward do exist and must now be implemented.

For example, some developed countries have put policies in place to stop active recruitment of health workers from severely understaffed countries.

"Some developing countries have revised their pay scales and introduced non-monetary incentives to retain their workforce and deploy them in rural areas," the WHO says.

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