10 thousand health workers left after the resignation ban imposed due to the pandemic was lifted

According to health statistics, Turkey's physician shortage has increased significantly compared to the European Union and OECD countries. General Health Workers' Union (Genel Sağlık-İş) Chair Derya Uğur said that the number of health workers who retired or resigned after the resignation ban was lifted reached 10,000 and that a significant portion of those who left were specialists.

Speaking to Sözcü's Saygı Öztürk, Derya Uğur said, "There is a remarkable increase in the number of people going abroad from critical branches such as emergency medicine, neurosurgery, anaesthesiology and reanimation, general surgery, paediatrics, gynaecology and obstetrics."

Stating that the number of preferences in these branches in the Medical Speciality Examination (TUS) preferences has decreased considerably, Uğur said, "If applications to go abroad continue in this way, we estimate that the number will reach 3 thousand this year. This situation is a source of great sadness for us."

The increase in the number of physicians requesting documents to go abroad is also reflected in the data. In 2002, the number of physicians requesting a licence to go abroad was 59; in the first 7 months of 2022, it reached 1402. Uğur said that academic staff also has an important place among these physicians.

Drawing attention to violence in health, Uğur said, "Despite all the difficulties, physicians are forced to choose their 'right to live' by putting aside their profession, which they have laboured for decades."

Drawing attention to the fact that the health system will be blocked if this continues, Derya Uğur stated that problems such as violence in health, intensive work, poor working conditions, unqualified managers, and the gradual decrease in the purchasing power of wages consume health workers.

Uğur reminded that President Tayyip Erdoğan said "Let them go if they want to go" and said, "However, it has been seen that the situation is not that simple. If there is no change in the current conditions, if violence cannot be prevented, it will be inevitable that our citizens will not be able to access quality health services." (EVRENSEL DAILY)