ZIMBABWE IS set to make it illegal for foreign countries to recruit its medical professionals.

The country’s Vice-President and health minister, Constantino Chiwenga, unveiled the plans yesterday which are aimed at stopping the loss of the plans experienced healthcare professionals to other countries, an issue which has been a long-standing problem for the southern African country’s healthcare system.

Theft

Chiwenga compared the loss of healthcare workers to human trafficking as he unveiled the plans, and promised tougher punishments for those responsible for what he described as a theft of human capital.

“If one deliberately recruits and makes the country suffer, that’s a crime against humanity. People are dying in hospitals because there are no nurses and doctors. That must be taken seriously,” he said.  

“Zimbabwe frowns at this heinous crime which is also a grave violation of human rights”.  

According to local media reports over 4,000 doctors and nurses have left Zimbabwe since February 2021. The National Health Service has been a popular destination for medical professionals due to the higher wages they can earn.

Dangers

Last month the UK health care agencies stopped recruiting Zimbabwean health workers following the decision by the World Health Organization (WHO) to put the southern African country on its Health Workforce Support and Safeguards List 2023, which highlighted eight countries that have dangerously low numbers of healthcare workers.  Mozambique, Zambia, Malawi and Tanzania, which some of the countries on the list. 

WHO’’s publication of the list was widely welcomed by leading figures in Zimbabwe’s health sector.

Engelbert Mbengwa acting secretary of the Health Services Commission, said: “The UK has always had its own code in recruitment and, therefore, this placement gives them an even bigger interface to regularise if not completely stop the active recruitment directly by government agents from the UK.”

According to the Zimbabwe Medical Association, the country has about 3,500 doctors for a population of 15 million people.

Zimbabwe is also facing an economic crisis characterized by high inflation that has significantly reduced wages.