According to reports by Shingai Nyoka of BBC, health clinics in Zimbabwe are facing a crisis as a significant number of their nurses are leaving for better opportunities outside the country mostly in the United Kingdom.
Perpetua Kaseke, the acting Chief Nursing Officer for the authorities in the capital, Harare, told Nyoka that most of her clinics were operating at 50% capacity as most of them have left to the UK or Ireland, others to Zimbabwe’s neighboring countries. Most nurses in Zimbabwe are underpaid and can barely afford rent and other needs. They are now fed up.
According to Zimbabwe’s State Health Service Board, over 2,200 medical personnel left its services last year alone of which 900 of them were nurses.
Nyoka spoke to one nurse who had left for the United Kingdom since last July and he indicated that he now earns about 10 times what he did back in Zimbabwe and the money he sends back goes a long way. He can now afford to send his children to boarding school and support other family members in need.
