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When the Berner Insel Group announced the final closure of two hospitals a week ago, CEO Bernhard Pulver (57) left no doubt about it: a lack of skilled workers. You have to consolidate the offers and locations, says Pulver: “Only in this way can we relieve the staff and at the same time make optimal use of it.”
The citizens of Bern are not alone in their concerns. All hospitals that SonntagsBlick has surveyed speak of a shortage of qualified personnel. There are currently 200 vacancies in the healthcare sector at the University Hospital of Zurich and 50 vacancies at the Canton Hospital St. Gallen. At the end of 2022, 13,500 nurses and doctors were missing across Switzerland. And there is no improvement in sight: according to an estimate by consultancy PWC, 45,000 jobs in healthcare could remain vacant in 2040, almost 40,000 in healthcare alone.
Benefits do not solve the problem
No wonder the hospitals do everything they can to keep their employees. University Hospital Zurich increased the allowances for night and weekend shifts, paid an expense allowance of 3.1 percent and granted all employees an extra day off.
In the Inselspital in Bern, the teams in the bed departments were expanded in order to respond as flexibly as possible to the employees’ working hours.
However, the problem cannot be solved with benefits alone. Hospitals are therefore increasingly relying on recruitment abroad. The Canton Hospital Aarau does castings in Rome, the private hospital group Hirslanden advertised Switzerland as a location at a trade fair in Berlin. The university hospitals in Zurich and Bern are also looking for specialists across the border. There they enter into partnerships with companies that recruit nurses and place advertisements.
This is not a legal issue – the free movement of persons applies. Ethically, however, things are different. Switzerland is a signatory to the WHO Code of Practice on the Recruitment of Health Professionals, which requires each country to train and retain specialists. Switzerland is far from that, says Martin Leschhorn (53), managing director of Medicus Mundi, a network for fair cooperation in healthcare. Even if the WHO code contains no binding specifications, aggressive poaching abroad is ethically questionable.
Poaching is a domino effect
The situation there hardly differs from that in Switzerland and is often even more precarious. “We have a huge shortage of nurses in Germany, which will become even greater in the coming years as the baby boomers retire,” said Anja Kathrin Hild, spokeswoman for the professional association for nurses. There are currently 200,000 full-time vacancies. The situation in Austria is similar. In 2022 there were 28,000 vacancies in the healthcare sector, 40 percent more than the year before.
The fact that Switzerland is going on a recruitment trip abroad at a time when there is a shortage of skilled workers across Europe is irritating there. Anja Kathrin Hild of the German Nursing Association: “In our opinion poaching colleagues from other countries should not lead or contribute to a deterioration of the care situation in the country of origin.” This also applies to recruiting and poaching from Germany. Herbert Motter, spokesman for the Vorarlberg Chamber of Commerce, says: “This is obviously not a pleasant situation.” Austria has a huge need, especially in the healthcare sector. You also try to find what you are looking for abroad, for example with the specialist initiative “Chancenland Vorarlberg”. Motter: “We’re all in the same boat.”
The hunt for talent can have serious consequences, such as a certain domino effect. While Switzerland or Germany recruit skilled workers in Poland, Eastern Europeans, for example, look for replacements in the Philippines. Ultimately, countries with only a weak health system suffer from undersupply.
The wealthy West could also feel the consequences. For example, if the next pandemic breaks out. Medicus Mundi director Martin Leschhorn: “If there is a lack of specialized personnel to limit the spread of the pathogen in the event of an outbreak, this could ultimately endanger safety in Switzerland.”
Source:Blick
I am Liam Livingstone and I work in a news website. My main job is to write articles for the 24 Instant News. My specialty is covering politics and current affairs, which I’m passionate about. I have worked in this field for more than 5 years now and it’s been an amazing journey. With each passing day, my knowledge increases as well as my experience of the world we live in today.
