MANILA Nick Lubo, 35, has packed two suitcases, a backpack and a jacket. He is leaving on an evening flight to Germany.
The work of an operating room nurse in a Philippine provincial hospital is replaced by the work of a community nurse in a North German nursing home.
Finland desperately needs new nurses from the Philippines. Lubo never thought about Finland when choosing a country to go to work.
– Finland is not active on social media. Maybe that’s why I didn’t consider it, he says.
Germany appealed because he saw pictures of castles and dreamed of peaceful walks in the woods.
So you don’t know much about Finland?
– Yes, I’m sorry, he says politely.
Also Jhosan Sinarao35, spins his head when asked about Finland.
She works in the maternity ward in the capital, Manila, and is preparing to leave for the United States.
– I haven’t really heard anything about Finland, he says.
“Philippines health care could collapse”
The demand for Filipino nurses is growing everywhere.
The world has a deep shortage of nurses after the pandemic, and many countries are thirsty for labor from the Philippines. The country has traditionally sent the most nurses abroad.
However, now the Philippines is also experiencing a shortage of nurses.
The country’s Ministry of Health warned in September that the country’s hospitals are even lacking 106,000 caregivers (you switch to another service).
Nurses in the Philippines have also taken final accounts during the pandemic. The working conditions were already miserable before, and the nurses’ salary has been worst (you switch to another service) throughout Southeast Asia.
Nurses earn on average in the Philippines around 500 euros (you switch to another service)many much less than this.
More and more of them have gone abroad or changed jobs, for example in a telephone service, where they earn more than in a hospital.
The Association of Private Hospitals has said that the Philippines healthcare can collapse (you switch to another service)unless the government stops the mass exodus of nurses.
The situation has quickly turned upside down, because just a few years ago there was an oversupply of nurses in the Philippines. Education was cut, and access to jobs in the field became more difficult.
At the moment, they would also like to hire people who have not worked in the nursing field at all after graduating.
There were starting quotas for nurses, and that worries many
At the beginning of the corona pandemic, the Philippines prevented caregivers from moving abroad to guarantee the availability of care at home.
Then the country introduced quotas. They are still valid: this year the country will allow 7,500 nurses to move abroad.
Even in 2019, for example, there were more than twice as many departures, around 17,000.
The departure quota has worried Filipino nurses and the countries that recruit them.
– We have the right to a better standard of living and greener pastures. There shouldn’t be any restrictions, says the person who promotes the interests of caregivers Robert Mendoza.
He is the president of the Alliance for Health Workers of the Philippines.
The Philippine General Hospital, the largest hospital in the Philippines, also understands the need for nurses to leave, even though there is a chronic shortage of workers.
– It’s sad, but we can’t force them to stay because the government is unlikely to be able to offer much higher salaries, says the head of the clinical nursing department Gloria Almariego.
Both Almariego and Mendoza criticized the country’s health ministry for complaining about the nursing shortage but not investing more in nurses’ salaries, working conditions and permanent contracts.
There is also a shortage of other healthcare professionals, such as midwives, dentists and pharmacists. Even the industry teachers (you move to another service) has gone abroad.
If the workforce decreases and more money is not budgeted for health care, Mendoza also considers its collapse possible.
Top countries Saudi Arabia, Great Britain – Finland comes a long way behind
Jhosan Sinarao, who works in the maternity ward, previously worked in Saudi Arabia. The Middle East is one of the top destinations for Filipino nurses because the salaries are good and the benefits are often generous.
Other overwhelming favorites are the English-speaking countries: the United Kingdom, the United States, Canada and Singapore are in the lead.
Moving to these countries is in the minds of Filipinos because most of them already speak good English.
The United States in particular has been the promised land for Filipino nurses – after all, Philippine nursing education was created in the first place to the needs of Americans (you switch to another service).
Germany recruits nurses from EU countries most diligently.
Operating room nurse Nick Lubon assured that the entire recruitment process in Germany was easy and free. Studying the language was hard, but even that education was paid for.
– Germans are also friendly towards us Asians, he says.
More and more countries have been willing to sign bilateral agreements with the Philippines, which would allow nurses to be recruited past the starting quotas. They have done this, among other things United Kingdom (switching to another service) and Germany (you switch to another service).
When the competition for nurses is getting tougher and the most important starting criteria for Filipinos are salary and language, Finland is not particularly strong in the competition.
Finland’s strength is related, among other things, to the image of the ease of family reunification. Filipinos associate this idea with Northern Europe.
Nurses do not feel that they owe the state
Nick Lubo does not see his departure abroad as a problem.
– I am worried about the situation in the Philippines, but we also have our own future and our own parents to help, says Lubo.
He is single himself.
In the Philippines, nursing training is usually an investment for the whole family, made specifically with a lucrative foreign career in mind. Education is mostly offered in private schools, and it is expensive.
In practice, the export of nurses is therefore financed by the migrant workers themselves, not the state. That is why many caregivers do not feel that they owe the state anything.
At the same time, the state needs money flows sent by migrant workers.
Jhosan Sinarao is confident that the nurse factory will continue to run and that more nurses are being trained all the time.
He himself would be ready to stay in the Philippines if the government doubled the salaries of nurses.
The previous president Rodrigo Duterte doubled the income of policemen and soldiers. Now many expect that the current president Ferdinand Marcos Junior would do the same for nurses.
President Marcos has said he understands the nurses’ plight. He hopes that recruiting countries will spend scholarships (you transfer to another service)which would make nurses stay in the Philippines at least for a while.
– We have to find ways to keep them here. People cannot be stopped from pursuing a better life, a better future, Marcos said (you switch to another service).
Discuss the topic until Thursday, December 15 at 11 p.m.