We left Ghana this spring very concerned for the hospital where we worked, Baptist Medical Centre, because for the first time in its 50 year history it was facing the prospect of have zero physicians on its staff. This is a hospital that treats well over a thousand patients a week. Thanks be to God that the hospital has signed a contract with a Nigerian surgeon who is graduating from a PAACS residency program site. PAACS (Pan-African Academy of Christian Surgeons) is an organization started by American missionary surgeons who want to work themselves out of a job. They are turning mission hospitals into residency training sites for Christian African medical students who are committed to staying in Africa after their training to serve their own people. This may not seem significant, except that between 25%-90% of health personnel trained in African medical schools (rates vary for each county) have left the continent for better paying jobs in Europe and the United States. Africa also accounts for 1/4 of the world’s global disease burden, but has only 3% of its workforce to care for it. The map included shows the global distribution of working physicians. What happened to Sub-Saharan Africa? It’s almost not present.
Who could fault the medical personnel leaving Africa for wanting a better life for themselves and their families? I certainly can’t, as I can run back to America with its first-world amenities anytime I want. What is somewhat more troubling, however, is that 25% of the United States’ physician workforce is made up of foreign medical graduates and growing, which means that we are in a sense complicit in draining poor regions such as Africa of the talent they need to maintain and improve their health care systems. We do need more physicians in the United States, but we also need to think about the effect of our actions on the poorer populations of the other nations involved as we contribute to their “brain drain.” How will it change? That’s a difficult question, but we praise God again for organizations like PAACS that are producing real solutions as evidenced by the provision of a surgeon for Baptist Medical Centre as they seek to spread the gospel by word and deed.
Who could fault the medical personnel leaving Africa for wanting a better life for themselves and their families? I certainly can’t, as I can run back to America with its first-world amenities anytime I want. What is somewhat more troubling, however, is that 25% of the United States’ physician workforce is made up of foreign medical graduates and growing, which means that we are in a sense complicit in draining poor regions such as Africa of the talent they need to maintain and improve their health care systems. We do need more physicians in the United States, but we also need to think about the effect of our actions on the poorer populations of the other nations involved as we contribute to their “brain drain.” How will it change? That’s a difficult question, but we praise God again for organizations like PAACS that are producing real solutions as evidenced by the provision of a surgeon for Baptist Medical Centre as they seek to spread the gospel by word and deed.
