Brexit has worsened shortage of NHS doctors, analysis shows | NHS United Kingdom By aljmaheerpress On Nov 27, 2022 0 Share Brexit has exacerbated the UK’s acute shortage of doctors in key areas of care and resulted in more than 4,000 European doctors choosing not to work in the NHS, research shows.The revelation comes as more and more medics are disillusioned with their relentlessly busy work lives in the increasingly overburdened healthcare system.Official figures show that the NHS has vacancies for 10,582 doctors in England alone.Britain has 4,285 fewer European doctors than if the rising number that came before the Brexit vote in 2016 had been maintained since then, according to an analysis by health think tank Nuffield Trust it has shared with the Guardian.In 2021, a total of 37,035 doctors from the EU and the European Free Trade Area (EFTA) were working in the UK.However, it would have been 41,320 – or 4,285 more – had the decision to leave the EU not resulted in a “slowdown” in medical recruitment from the EU and the EFTA quartet of Norway, Iceland, Switzerland and Liechtenstein.Doctors from the EU/European Free Trade Area working in the UK – chart The drop-off has left four major types of medical specialties that have long been in short supply of physicians — anesthesia, pediatrics, psychiatry, and heart and lung treatment — lagging behind the demand for care that has increased due to Covid and an aging population.
Just one example of how the delay is affecting day-to-day NHS care is the limit on the number of surgeries that can take place, said Nuffield Trust researcher Martha McCarey, the lead author of the analysis.The UK has 394 fewer EU/EFTA anaesthesiologists than if numbers had continued pre-Brexit, she found.“The NHS is struggling to recruit vital specialists such as home anaesthetists, and Brexit appears to be exacerbating longstanding staff shortages in some professions.Without anesthesiologists, many operations cannot go ahead,” she said.The findings come amid calls from business leaders for ministers to rethink how immigration to Britain works to help overcome labor shortages across the economy.These have deepened in recent years, in part due to the UK ending the automatic free movement of EU nationals.The Confederation of British Industry has made that demand particularly clear.
The Nuffield Trust blames the attrition of doctors on the fact that EU-trained doctors who want to work in the UK are now faced with additional bureaucracy and higher costs as a direct result of Brexit.“Since the referendum campaign, increased costs, increased paperwork and uncertainty about visas due to Brexit have been among the biggest barriers to recruiting and retaining EU and EFTA doctors,” said McCarey.
The NHS would have 369 fewer cardiothoracic surgeons, 288 fewer paediatricians and 165 fewer psychiatrists if recruitment patterns from before the 2016 vote had been maintained.Daisy Cooper, the Liberal Democrat health spokeswoman and deputy leader, said the non-arrival of 4,285 EU/EFTA medics was “shocking”.She added: “From absurd pension rules to costly visas, the Conservatives are strangling our pipeline of NHS staff with red tape.The NHS is on its knees after years of Conservative government driving the service into the ground.
“These numbers are shocking and even more evidence if needed for the Conservatives’ incompetence.” Brexit has had a much more damaging effect on the NHS’s ability to hire nurses from the EU.While 9,389 nurses and midwives who trained in the block came to work in Britain in 2015-2016, only 663 did so in 2021-22, according to data released by the Nursing and Midwifery Council (NMC) in May.However, that dramatic drop was offset by a huge surge in professionals from the rest of the world, particularly India and the Philippines, the regulator said.A report due this week from the NMC is expected to confirm that the trends have continued over the past few months.
Every weekday morning, Archie Bland and Nimo Omer take you through the top stories and what they mean for free Privacy declaration: Newsletters may contain information about charities, online advertising, and content funded by third parties.For more information see our Privacy Policy.We use Google reCaptcha to protect our website and Google Privacy Policy and Terms of Service apply.The UK has 58,000 fewer nurses than if the numbers arriving before Brexit had continued.“Nursing saw a much more dramatic collapse in EU and EFTA migration around the time of the referendum, when mass recruitment stopped and a new language test was introduced,” the NMC analysis said.While there are 29,000, that would be a whopping 87,000 if things hadn’t changed in 2016, it estimated.
The British Medical Association (BMA), the main doctors’ union, regretted the smaller than expected number of European doctors deciding to work in the UK since Brexit.“While we have such severe staff shortages in the NHS, including nearly 11,000 medical vacancies in UK hospitals alone, it is deeply disappointing that Brexit has resulted in us missing out on over 4,000 EU doctors who could care for patients,” said Dr.
Kitty Mohan, the chair of the BMA’s International Medical Board.“Even with efforts to increase the domestic supply of doctors, given the long time it takes to train these specialists, we will still fall short without recruiting and retaining our EU and international colleagues.” Research published in March 2021 found that Brexit left many European doctors already in the UK feeling unwelcome, alienated and uncertain about their future working life in Britain.The decision to leave the EU had a “profound impact” on those medics.
And it caused “anger, worry and frustration, along with objective concerns about legal status, qualifications, education and pensions that contributed to the strong impact of Brexit on their personal and professional lives,” the study by academics from Brunel University and Queen Mary University of London found.
The Guardian approached the Ministry of Health and Social Care for comment.0 Share.
