G8 news

Africa's health workers

WHEN HE chairs the G8 summit at Gleneagles this July, Tony Blair will no doubt give another rendition of his anti-poverty - “the state of Africa is a scar on the conscience of the world” - speech.

But Tony should examine his own policies which are contributing to the impoverishment of the continent. Not least the looting of health workers from African countries to fill labour shortages in Britain’s NHS.

Some 12,500 doctors and 16,000 nursing staff from Africa are working in Britain’s health services. The BBC calculates that it cost African countries £270 million to train these workers.

Many countries that supply trained health workers to the West are hard hit by the Aids pandemic. Malawi has seen 100 trained health workers obtain work abroad in the last two years. Since 1999 Ghana has ‘exported’ more nurses to Western countries than it has trained. And of the 600 physicians trained in Zambia since independence, only 50 are currently still working in their own country.

The government admits that the ban on NHS recruitment from poor countries is failing because they are either recruited via the private sector or as ‘temporary’ workers whose contracts are then repeatedly extended.