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The real issue is that developed countries refuse to import doctors. Developed countries have medical doctors associations which keep a close eye on who can be

The real issue is that developed countries refuse to import doctors. Developed countries have medical doctors associations which keep a close eye on who can become doctor and how, thus limiting the number of doctors in the country and sustaining their high wages. From what I've heard, you have to get an expensive education and then live thru a long and undercompensated and exhausting internship in order to become a full doctor and get all the perks. Any immigrant will also have to face that kind of internship (not easy for someone without a source of income) plus they have to re-learn a lot of things in order to pass the certification. I might be fuzzy on the details, but still: we're lucky in our IT, we have comparative small amount of bullshit and entrenching.

maxerickson 12y ago
It's just the opposite: http://www.ft.com/cms/s/0/9647519c-207a-11e3-b8c6-00144feab7de.html#axzz3FNWxlNtQ http://www.ft.com/cms/s/0/9647519c-207a-11e3-b8c6-00144feab7... Doctors tend to leave undeveloped countries for developed countries.
- guard-of-terra 12y ago
  It's behind paywall.
  - maxerickson 12y ago
    Here's the research discussed at the FT link: http://www.plosmedicine.org/article/info%3Adoi%2F10.1371%2Fjournal.pmed.1001513 http://www.plosmedicine.org/article/info%3Adoi%2F10.1371%2Fj...
    - guard-of-terra 12y ago
      "and by agreeing to provide care in areas that are underserved by US physicians" This changes the perspective slightly.
- adaml_623 12y ago
  To see this article search for the following on google and click on the top link: "study highlights scale of african doctors brain drain"
dunder 12y ago
>The real issue is that developed countries refuse to import doctors. That's completely ridiculous. Developed countries actively import doctors, going so far as to genuinely trying to lure them by advertising the kinds of salaries they can get. Countries like Sweden, Norway, Germany, etc. now get significant numbers of their dcotors from abroad. Because their own population doesn't provide enough doctors. Additionally, the foreign ones tend to be cheaper (both because they're paid less but also because you don't need to put them through education). It's so extreme that in some developing countries of Europe, half the doctors leave for the above-mentioned developed countries.
- guard-of-terra 12y ago
  Maybe that's because you have some kind of inter-EU arrangements?
pessimizer 12y ago
The US refuses to import doctors, and throws up protectionist barriers in order to keep them out, but I don't think this can be said about developed countries in general. http://www.cepr.net/index.php/blogs/beat-the-press/rewriting-history-on-doctor-shortages-protectionists-bury-the-bodies http://www.cepr.net/index.php/blogs/beat-the-press/rewriting... "Any discussion of an alleged shortage of doctors in the United States should include an account of the doctors' efforts to create this shortage to keep their salaries high. It is also striking that, unlike the case of STEM workers, nurses, or farm workers, no one discusses bringing in more foreign doctors to alleviate this shortage. There would be hundreds of thousands, perhaps millions, of foreign physicians who would be happy to train to U.S. standards and work for even half of the pay that doctors get in the United States. This would reduce the cost of health care in the United States, freeing up tens of billions of dollars to be spent in other areas creating hundreds of thousands of jobs. "And, we do know how to ensure that importing more foreign doctors does not hurt health care in the developing world. If the income taxes paid by foreign trained doctors were transferred to their home country, they could easily train 2-3 doctors for every doctor that came to the United States. This would ensure that developing countries gained from this arrangement as well." edit: Path to United States Practice Is Long Slog to Foreign Doctors http://www.nytimes.com/2013/08/12/business/economy/long-slog-for-foreign-doctors-to-practice-in-us.html?ref=business http://www.nytimes.com/2013/08/12/business/economy/long-slog... "The biggest challenge is that an immigrant physician must win one of the coveted slots in America’s medical residency system, the step that seems to be the tightest bottleneck. "That residency, which typically involves grueling 80-hour workweeks, is required even if a doctor previously did a residency in a country with an advanced medical system, like Britain or Japan. The only exception is for doctors who did their residencies in Canada. "The whole process can consume upward of a decade — for those lucky few who make it through."
bdevani 12y ago
I'm with dunder. The flux of Asian immigration in the 60s, after the caps on these countries were lifted, was focused on skilled labor where there was limited US supply. AKA doctors. We in the US still have this eye towards immigration of the skilled. While it is currently less in the medical field, it continues due to the lack of services in rural areas. In Europe many Romanian doctors leave Romania and make much better wages in England and other countries. In India and so many other countries, many left for the US. Being a doctor had social weight and financial weight that it no longer carries here, in the US.
- pessimizer 12y ago
  >We in the US still have this eye towards immigration of the skilled. This is untrue in almost all situations that I'm aware of, other than nursing and IT. http://www.nytimes.com/2013/08/12/business/economy/long-slog-for-foreign-doctors-to-practice-in-us.html http://www.nytimes.com/2013/08/12/business/economy/long-slog... "'It took me double the time I thought, since I was still having to work while I was studying to pay for the visa, which was very expensive,' said Alisson Sombredero, 33, an H.I.V. specialist who came to the United States from Colombia in 2005. "Dr. Sombredero spent three years studying for her American license exams, gathering recommendation letters and volunteering at a hospital in an unpaid position. She supported herself during that time by working as a nanny. That was followed by three years in a residency at Highland Hospital in Oakland, Calif., and one year in an H.I.V. fellowship at San Francisco General Hospital. She finally finished her training this summer, eight years after she arrived in the United States and 16 years after she first enrolled in medical school. "Dr. Sombredero was helped through the process by the Welcome Back Initiative, an organization started 12 years ago as a partnership between San Francisco State University and City College of San Francisco. The organization has worked with about 4,600 physicians in its centers around the country, according to its founder, José Ramón Fernández-Peña. "Only 118 of those doctors, he said, have successfully made it to residency. "'If I had to even think about going through residency now, I’d shoot myself,' said Dr. Fernández-Peña, who came to the United States from Mexico in 1985 and chose not even to try treating patients once he learned what the licensing process requires."

maxerickson 12y ago

It's just the opposite: http://www.ft.com/cms/s/0/9647519c-207a-11e3-b8c6-00144feab7de.html#axzz3FNWxlNtQ http://www.ft.com/cms/s/0/9647519c-207a-11e3-b8c6-00144feab7... Doctors tend to leave undeveloped countries for developed countries.

guard-of-terra 12y ago
It's behind paywall.
- maxerickson 12y ago
  Here's the research discussed at the FT link: http://www.plosmedicine.org/article/info%3Adoi%2F10.1371%2Fjournal.pmed.1001513 http://www.plosmedicine.org/article/info%3Adoi%2F10.1371%2Fj...
  - guard-of-terra 12y ago
    "and by agreeing to provide care in areas that are underserved by US physicians" This changes the perspective slightly.
adaml_623 12y ago
To see this article search for the following on google and click on the top link: "study highlights scale of african doctors brain drain"

dunder 12y ago

>The real issue is that developed countries refuse to import doctors. That's completely ridiculous. Developed countries actively import doctors, going so far as to genuinely trying to lure them by advertising the kinds of salaries they can get. Countries like Sweden, Norway, Germany, etc. now get significant numbers of their dcotors from abroad. Because their own population doesn't provide enough doctors. Additionally, the foreign ones tend to be cheaper (both because they're paid less but also because you don't need to put them through education). It's so extreme that in some developing countries of Europe, half the doctors leave for the above-mentioned developed countries.

guard-of-terra 12y ago
Maybe that's because you have some kind of inter-EU arrangements?

pessimizer 12y ago

The US refuses to import doctors, and throws up protectionist barriers in order to keep them out, but I don't think this can be said about developed countries in general. http://www.cepr.net/index.php/blogs/beat-the-press/rewriting-history-on-doctor-shortages-protectionists-bury-the-bodies http://www.cepr.net/index.php/blogs/beat-the-press/rewriting... "Any discussion of an alleged shortage of doctors in the United States should include an account of the doctors' efforts to create this shortage to keep their salaries high. It is also striking that, unlike the case of STEM workers, nurses, or farm workers, no one discusses bringing in more foreign doctors to alleviate this shortage. There would be hundreds of thousands, perhaps millions, of foreign physicians who would be happy to train to U.S. standards and work for even half of the pay that doctors get in the United States. This would reduce the cost of health care in the United States, freeing up tens of billions of dollars to be spent in other areas creating hundreds of thousands of jobs. "And, we do know how to ensure that importing more foreign doctors does not hurt health care in the developing world. If the income taxes paid by foreign trained doctors were transferred to their home country, they could easily train 2-3 doctors for every doctor that came to the United States. This would ensure that developing countries gained from this arrangement as well." edit: Path to United States Practice Is Long Slog to Foreign Doctors http://www.nytimes.com/2013/08/12/business/economy/long-slog-for-foreign-doctors-to-practice-in-us.html?ref=business http://www.nytimes.com/2013/08/12/business/economy/long-slog... "The biggest challenge is that an immigrant physician must win one of the coveted slots in America’s medical residency system, the step that seems to be the tightest bottleneck. "That residency, which typically involves grueling 80-hour workweeks, is required even if a doctor previously did a residency in a country with an advanced medical system, like Britain or Japan. The only exception is for doctors who did their residencies in Canada. "The whole process can consume upward of a decade — for those lucky few who make it through."

bdevani 12y ago

I'm with dunder. The flux of Asian immigration in the 60s, after the caps on these countries were lifted, was focused on skilled labor where there was limited US supply. AKA doctors. We in the US still have this eye towards immigration of the skilled. While it is currently less in the medical field, it continues due to the lack of services in rural areas. In Europe many Romanian doctors leave Romania and make much better wages in England and other countries. In India and so many other countries, many left for the US. Being a doctor had social weight and financial weight that it no longer carries here, in the US.

pessimizer 12y ago
>We in the US still have this eye towards immigration of the skilled. This is untrue in almost all situations that I'm aware of, other than nursing and IT. http://www.nytimes.com/2013/08/12/business/economy/long-slog-for-foreign-doctors-to-practice-in-us.html http://www.nytimes.com/2013/08/12/business/economy/long-slog... "'It took me double the time I thought, since I was still having to work while I was studying to pay for the visa, which was very expensive,' said Alisson Sombredero, 33, an H.I.V. specialist who came to the United States from Colombia in 2005. "Dr. Sombredero spent three years studying for her American license exams, gathering recommendation letters and volunteering at a hospital in an unpaid position. She supported herself during that time by working as a nanny. That was followed by three years in a residency at Highland Hospital in Oakland, Calif., and one year in an H.I.V. fellowship at San Francisco General Hospital. She finally finished her training this summer, eight years after she arrived in the United States and 16 years after she first enrolled in medical school. "Dr. Sombredero was helped through the process by the Welcome Back Initiative, an organization started 12 years ago as a partnership between San Francisco State University and City College of San Francisco. The organization has worked with about 4,600 physicians in its centers around the country, according to its founder, José Ramón Fernández-Peña. "Only 118 of those doctors, he said, have successfully made it to residency. "'If I had to even think about going through residency now, I’d shoot myself,' said Dr. Fernández-Peña, who came to the United States from Mexico in 1985 and chose not even to try treating patients once he learned what the licensing process requires."