Caricom seeking to manage nurses migration
-900 lost to UK, North America in 2002-3
Stabroek News
May 6, 2004
Caricom health ministers have been discussing the management of the migration of nurses in view of the loss of some 900 nurses to the United Kingdom and North America between 2002 and 2003.
The Council for Human and Social Development (COHSOD) at its April month-end meeting in Tobago recognised the need to develop strategies and mechanisms to recruit and retain nurses and other health professionals, in view of the economic cost to the region of the loss of its investment and training through migration.
The COHSOD supported a review of the existing policies to ensure that they are consistent with the enhanced recruitment and retention of nurses in the region, according to a communiqué issued by the Caricom Secretariat in Georgetown.
These are among the decisions coming out of the Tenth Meeting of COHSOD on Health, the Environment and Sustainable Development, which was convened under the chairmanship of John Rahael, Minister of Health, Trinidad and Tobago, at the Tobago Hilton, Scarborough.
It was also agreed that there should be regional representation at the proposed Commonwealth Secretariat Meeting on Trade in Services, with specific reference to Mode IV, which is scheduled for October 2004. The COHSOD also endorsed the Declaration on Nursing issued by the International Nurses Conference on Managed Migration held in Barbados this year.
The meeting was held under the theme 'Investing in Human Resources with Special Reference to Health, Sustainable Development and the Environment'. Guyana was represented by Minister of Health, Dr Leslie Ramsammy.