Okyenhene Osagyefo Amoatia Ofori-Panin has expressed concern over the rate of medical brain drain in Ghana.
Speaking at the 2023 Retreat for the Medical Superintendent Group in the Eastern Region, under the Theme: ‘Enhancing Hospital Management Systems for Improved Health Care delivery’; the Okyenhene opined that the phenomenon of medical personnel leaving the shores of Ghana in search of greener pastures on a daily basis have a devastating consequences on the nation’s health system.
Osagyefo Amoatia Ofori Panin hinted that in 2019, Ghana had about 3,236 medical doctors attending to a population of about 30 million, making the ‘doctor to patient’ ratio far below any acceptable standards.
He said a 2015 study showed that the number of African-trained international medical graduates practising in the US alone reached a staggering 13,584 equivalent to about one African-educated physician migrating to the US per day over the last decade.
He said that the studies further showed that 86% of all African-educated physicians working in the US were trained in Ghana, Egypt, Nigeria, and South Africa.
“The sad aspect of this is that the beneficiary destination countries do not pay for the cost of training of African doctors they recruit. One in ten doctors working in the UK comes from Africa. This means that the UK saves an average of 2.7 billion dollars on training costs. This is a big loss to our country”, Osagyefo Amoatia said.
He believes that the future of Africa’s youth does not lie in migration to Europe or America.
He said that currently, Ghana has a ratio of 9 doctors to 100,000 patients.
The Okyenhene acknowledged that medicine has a tradition of international collaboration with doctors moving around the globe to gain further training and different clinical experiences. However, he believes that what is happening with our medical personnel is not collaboration. It is a gradual march towards humanitarian disaster.
“The US employs half of English speaking doctors in the world. It wants more. By coincidence, the US wants to employ one million more healthcare workers in the next 15 years – exactly the extra number needed for sub-Saharan Africa, in line with the sustainable development goals”, Osagyefo noted.
He is saddened that the heart of this problem is an unending issue of remuneration.
Okyenhene Osagyefo Amoatia Ofori-Panin described as alarming, the lifestyle related deaths in Africa.
He observed that, just as our continent was getting a respite from communicable diseases such as Malaria, HIV/AIDS, Tuberculosis and Polio we are now confronted with an alarming increase in lifestyle diseases.
“Today, long considered diseases of the West such as diabetes, cancer, heart and respiratory diseases, often associated with the urban and affluent in society have crept silently into many corners in Africa. It has remained relatively unnoticed as our government focuses its attention in fighting malaria, HIV Aids, etc”.
He said that unhealthy diets, tobacco, excess alcohol and physical inactivity are major causes of these diseases.
‘These diseases now account for 70% of all deaths in the world. Our continent sits on a time bomb as it is estimated that within the next decade we would have the world’s largest increase in deaths from these lifestyle diseases ‘ OKyenhene revealed.
The situation, according to him, posed a serious threat to our national economy as it impedes efforts to fight poverty and achieve the sustainable development goals. The already overstretched health system would be unable to contain it.
Despite the difficulties, Osagyefo Amoatia Ofori-Panin believes that the government continues to invest huge resources to public health.
He said the recent establishment of the National Vaccine Institute, the Agenda 111, which aims to build a hospital in every district of the country, the four medical drone centers established to distribute blood and medicines in various parts of the country, the Free Specialist Post Graduate Medical Training, the over 300 Ambulances is evidence of government’s commitment to provide quality and accessible health care to our people.
