RIYADH — The Ministry of Health has reportedly dispatched 48 teams to recruit doctors and nurses from nine countries — Pakistan, India, Philippines, Egypt, Jordan, Tunisia, Nigeria, Lebanon and Sudan. According to a report published by Al-Madinah Arabic daily on Saturday, the teams will recruit doctors and nurses specialized in cardiology, ER and trauma, psychology and intensive care. "The move aims at recruiting highly experienced and talented medical staff for rare and vital specialities from advanced countries," the report said, adding that the recruitment will also consider specialists from Europe and the United States. The ministry also disclosed plans to hire foreign medical specialities for one year to meet its manpower requirements, especially after the opening of several new hospitals in the country. "We intend to hire 1,000 specialists from the Egyptian Health Ministry and medical colleges, 900 from Pakistan and 200 from Sudan," it added. The report said it was difficult to get qualified medical staff for rare specialities such as intensive care, neurosurgery, neonatal surgery and anesthesia because of international competition to recruit them and the growing numbers of hospitals in the Kingdom. The ministry has set up a recruitment department to face this challenge. There is a total of 317,000 expatriate health practitioners and doctors and only 139,000 Saudi health practitioners and doctors, a Ministry of Health source was quoted as saying last month. He said the ministry has stopped renewing the contracts of certified doctors and health practitioners working in administrative positions. There are many Saudi employees with degrees in medicine who are occupying administrative positions when they could work as doctors, said the source. There are 102,000 expatriate doctors in the health industry and only 25,800 Saudi doctors. There are also 39,000 expatriate pharmacists but only 7,000 Saudi pharmacists. There are 137,000 expatriate nurses but only 72,000 Saudi nurses, said the source. The source added that there are 33,000 Saudi specialists in applied medicine and 8,000 expatriate specialists. Earlier this month Shoura Council members wanted the responsibility for recruiting expatriate workers to be shifted from the Ministry of Labor to the Ministry of Interior. Shoura Council member Ali Al-Wizrah said the Ministry of Labor is not being fair to sponsors. There are 15 million expatriates in the Kingdom and 50,000 work visas are issued every day, he said.
