Before the National Health Insurance scheme can be implemented, the department must be able to provide enough doctors and nurses to meet the country's needs

THE Department of Health needs 83043 more professionals.

The staggering need was revealed in a detailed Human Resources Strategy document published on the department's website last week.

The draft strategy, which has taken three months to compile, stipulates exactly how many paramedics, nurses, doctors and dentists the department needs to hire for state facilities and how long they will need to reach their target.

The country has 554 anaesthetists in the state sector but needs 1299 more. It has 477 surgeons but needs another 730.

Before the National Health Insurance scheme can be implemented, the department must be able to provide enough doctors and nurses to meet the country's needs.

The document shows that in every category, it is far below the required staff to population ratio.

In order to meet the targets by 2025, the department is planning to attract 1650 anaesthetists and 1049 surgeons from other countries in addition to increasing the number of specialists trained at home. There are already 3004 foreign doctors in the country.

Between 2002 and 2010, 11700 doctors graduated from the country's eight medical schools, but only 4403 remained in public hospitals after their internship and community service.

The number of doctors and nurses who leave the country is "conservatively estimated at an annual rate of 25percent", the strategy document says. "The primary reason given for this choice is poor working conditions in the public sector, and not personal circumstances," it says.