The underlying tone of Dr Aitchison’s comments in the recent article about Three Rivers Medical being forced to reduce its hours of operation is to my mind, while giving a professional approach to our healthcare problems, almost desperate — and rightly so.
The competitive international staff market means overseas nurses will
need pay and work conditions that exceed those in their own countries. Why would they uproot themselves from similar or better working conditions to come here if not for residency?
Perhaps our residency will continue to be a back door into Australia. Residency is not itself a mandate whereby we can have a probational period if a person who finds the going too tough here they cannot resign, to perhaps go to Australia.
The answer is not just improved working conditions or some future vaccine that probably also does not lessen the chances of passing on the latest variants of the virus, even though it may be better at minimising the severity of disease.
In the meantime, while we wait for healthcare staff numbers to be stabilised, some marvellous advances will be made by medical science . . . but will just not be available to many of the general public.
Mandated nurses must be rehired. This will not be the only solution to the healthcare crisis, but it may just give our desperate health sector some breathing space.
Dennis Pennefather
