Examine the impact of the increased migration of health professionals for a country like South Africa. Which policy options might effectively reduce the harm associated with such migration.

Impact of the Increased Migration of African Health Professionals

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Impact of the Increased Migration of African Health Professionals

Migration of professionals especially from the health sector of developing countries in Africa has intensive effects on the health status of these nations . Even without the migration of health professionals to progressive countries like Canada and United Kingdom developing countries like those in Sub-Saharan Africa already have inadequate numbers of medical professionals to attend to the health

needs of the people . Hence , the continuous migration of health service providers to richer countries in Europe and America decreases the already low numbers of health professionals present in these third world countries . The quality of health services provided by the governments in Africa is adversely affected by the decreased numbers of medical professionals that will give the services (Awases , 2004 : 1-2

The problem of migration of health professionals occurs not only to countries outside the African Continent but rather also within the continent itself . Medical practitioners move from poorer countries to richer countries within the continent . The migration also takes place intra-country wherein the health professionals from the rural area move to urban areas (Labonte , 2006 : 1-3 . The public health systems that are mostly affected therefore are those of the rural areas and relatively poorer countries in Africa . Those citizens that are poor and can not afford the services of private healthcare providers thus relying on the public health system for their needs receive most of the negative impacts of health professional 's migration

Statistics serve as the evidence of the adverse effects of the continuous migration of African trained healthcare professionals . The estimated number of health professionals that migrate to other countries outside Africa is 23000 individuals per year . In Zimbabwe , roughly 50 percent of the Registered Nurses (RNs ) and 80 percent of the doctors already migrated (Zondagh :

. 5 . These migrations lead to the present ratio of medical doctors to the population in Sub-Saharan Africa of only lesser than 13 doctors per 100 ,000 members of the population . The present public health system status of these South African countries are contributing factors to the decreased life expectancy of their people the increased percentage of children dying before their fifth birthday and the non-resolution of the HIV /AIDS crisis (Labonte , 2006 : 1

In Southern Africa specifically in Zambia , the ratio of the number of nurses to the population is 1 per 1000 . Much worse is the situation in Uganda wherein the ratio is estimated to be 6 nurses per 100 , 000 members of the population . These statistics is in contrast to that of the developing countries in which there is a ratio of 1 nurse to a 110 people . The unequal division of the number of nurses adds to the burden in the ratio of nurses to the members of the population . The bulk of the nurses are located in urban areas thus the rural areas have a greater...