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The World Health Organization (WHO) has released guidance on the international recruitment of nurse practitioners and other health care workers in response to concerns that current practices harm developing countries and benefit rich countries.
The guide, titled Bilateral Agreements on the Immigration and Mobility of Health Workers, aims to promote a “new generation” of international recruitment agreements between countries that are fairer to both parties.
“[Financial contributions] Not compensating the loss of health personnel with many years of experience”
World Health Organization guidance
These bilateral agreements between the two countries are typically signed between the country of origin and the receiving country prior to the recruitment of nurses, doctors, and other health care personnel.
They may, but do not always, include a commitment by the host country to provide financial contributions or other benefits to the country of origin in exchange for the loss of health care workers.
But international organizations including the World Health Organization and the International Nursing Council, as well as UK nursing leaders, have criticized such agreements for not always being fair.
“Bilateral agreements on the migration and mobility of health workers are often driven by the needs of the destination country’s health sector, and in some cases have limited meaningful involvement from the origin country’s ministry of health,” the WHO’s new guidance states.
The guidance, with contributions from the Organization for Economic Co-operation and Development and the International Labor Organization, cited uneven “power dynamics” between host countries, which tend to be much wealthier, and countries of origin, which tend to be subject to high levels of constraints. migrant.
As a result, the WHO said current agreements tend to benefit host countries more, and any monetary investment in health systems in countries of origin often fails to offset the loss of experienced medical personnel.
“While bilateral agreements allow countries of origin to limit to some extent the negative impacts of health worker immigration and mobility, they do not generate investment in strengthening health systems,” the document states.
“Even if the destination country provides financial contributions to education in the country of origin, it cannot compensate for the loss of health personnel with many years of experience…”, the report states.
“Some countries of origin may face endless ongoing investments to increase the capacity of health workers and then recruit these health workers internationally, leaving their populations primarily served by primary health workers,” the report added.
The World Health Organization recommends that going forward, countries should develop a “new generation” of bilateral agreements that are less designed to benefit the economies of highly developed countries.
The WHO said the agreements should balance the interests of both countries and prioritize improving health outcomes over economic benefits for both countries.
“This will require signatories to clearly define the type and amount of investment and support, as well as other necessary safeguards, that will benefit health systems in countries of origin,” the guidance said.
It recommended that professional health organizations, trade unions, regulators, diaspora associations, employers and government departments consult on the agreements and said data collection would be vital to inform future new agreements.
The guidance was published this week in conjunction with World Health Workers Week.
James Campbell, director of WHO’s health workforce department, said the guidance would support fairer bilateral agreements in the future.
“We need a new generation of bilateral agreements that promote fair and ethical international migration and mobility of health workers, with commensurate benefits for health systems in both source and destination countries,” he added.
There have been repeated calls for such guidance from Britain’s leading nursing figures in recent years.
In 2023, Chief Nursing Officer Dame Ruth May spoke of the “ethical” dilemma of international recruitment and warned it could cause harm to developing countries if left unchecked.
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