The April ban has stopped more than 1,000 nurses from leaving the country. Of those, only 25 have applied to work in local hospitals, Health Secretary Francisco Duque III told journalists late last month. | reuters
Nurses have been leaving the Philippines for decades, encouraged by the government to join other workers who send back billions of dollars each year.
On the Zoom call in August, someone played a recording of the Philippine national anthem. A Catholic priest prayed and a man with a soft voice crooned a song about passing off your burdens to God.One nurse, 34-year-old April Glory, had already spent years away from her young son and had been about to leave again when the ban kicked in. Even before the pandemic, she told Reuters separately, she was better off in a war zone in the Middle East than at home.
Abroad, Glory’s shifts were a standard eight hours and she only looked after one or two patients at a time in intensive care. Working in Yemen and then Saudi Arabia, she said she bought a house and a car. A report to Britain’s House of Commons Library in May said more than 15,000 of the National Health Service nursing jobs held by foreigners went to Filipinos – nearly a third of the total and more than any other nationality. The NHS employs a further 6,600 Filipinos in other healthcare jobs.
It said hospitals should provide sufficient protective gear and that healthcare workers should not go on duty without it. Healthcare workers should be prioritized for regular COVID-19 testing, it said, and the Department would ensure there are enough beds for everyone.
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