Worldwide Nurse, Midwifery Crisis
Low pay, poor working conditions and uncertain career prospects are driving away nurses and midwives, leading to a worldwide crisis in the sector, the World Health Organization said Thursday.
"If the world's public health community does not correct this trend, the ability of many health systems to function will be seriously jeopardized," a group of experts said.
WHO said the average age of nurses in the United States, Britain and Canada is between 43 and 45, indicating that young people are not coming into the profession.
In Britain, health service managers have increased the number of overseas nurses they employ by 48 percent in 12 months, contributing to a "skills drain" in developing countries.
One hospital in Zambia which needs 1,500 nurses can only find 500, while in Chile only 8,000 of the 18,000 qualified nurses in the country are actually working in the profession, the U.N. health agency said.
"The poor are always the first to suffer during times of health care crisis," said Naeema Al-Gasseer, senior scientist at the WHO. "Nurses and midwives play pivotal roles in providing essential services to the poor, marginalized and underserved populations."
The organization said nurses are often in the front line of health care, in local clinics and health station, especially providing information on prevention HIV infection and other diseases.
In Chile, nurses run 94 percent of "well baby" clinics, which have cut child mortality in the country from 110,000 to 11,000 since they began in the 1970s.
The experts agreed that it was vital that nursing and midwifery should be a priority for the public and political agenda. They also called for a more systematic study of the effect of inadequate levels of nursing.
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