2 Aug 2022

New health workforce plan still reliant on foreign workers

From Midday Report, 12:20 pm on 2 August 2022

A health workforce expert says the government's newly announced staffing strategy will do little to ease New Zealand's reliance on foreign trained and born medical staff.

The new plan - announced yesterday - does increase the domestic supply of doctors and nurses with more training positions for GPs, nurse practitioners, and radiology registrars but there's a continued focus on securing staff from overseas.

The latest international figures - from 2019 - show Aotearoa is the second-most dependent on international medical graduates of the developed countries in the OECD.

Otago University professor Robin Gauld spoke to Māni Dunlop about the plan.