UK Doctors after Brexit
By: Ethar Alali
Tags: UK Politics, Nhs Crisis, Brexit, Nhs, Doctors

UK Doctors after Brexit

in October, Jeremy Hunt and Theresa May caused two storms by stating to EU and Foreign born doctors they are in the UK temporarily whilst the UK trains up it’s extra 1,500 new workforce. With the NHS at crisis point, is that number enough?

It’s extremely complex in a number of sub-areas. To use a simple Brexiteer argument against them “people wanting to come here, have to want to come here”.

Many Brexiteers, and it appears, Theresa May, think UK membership is some weird “privilege” stuffed up their ar*e with a silver spoon, which other countries don’t (they sure aren’t as stuck up). Non-EU nationals saw a drop in university uptake of of 6% themselves. Jeremy Hunt is a complete idiot if he assumed we can plug NHS doctor numbers instantly.

Hunt promises to end NHS reliance on overseas doctors after Britain leaves the EU (https://www.theguardian.com/politics/2016/oct/03/jeremy-hunt-promises-to-end-nhs-reliance-on-overseas-doctors-after-brexit)

And

PM under fire for saying foreign doctors are in UK only for ‘interim period’ (https://www.theguardian.com/politics/2016/oct/04/jeremy-hunt-accused-devaluing-contribution-foreign-doctors-to-uk)

1,500 places. Great! They’ll have the effect of plugging the current gap… in 14 years time at best?… No, actually NEVER!

Because in the meantime we’ll lose consultants who will:

Move out (they can work anywhere)

Choose to work in the private sector if they wish to stay (they can work anywhere, for less stress and more money) or retire.

The Retiring Service Rate

14 years is a long time. Many who voted Leave will themselves retire in 14 years time. Hence, by the time we get to 14 years, the number of places needed becomes unsurpassably high.

EU migrants make up 10% of doctors. That’s 10% of 252,553 = 25,255. In addition, around 6,000 doctors of any type *retire *every year, of which 1,026 are foreign educated. This analysis isn’t counting any other reason to leave the register (e.g. 23% of UK graduates go overseas).

In 14 years, we’re looking at 84,000 of the total number of doctors retiring, of which 14,369 are non-UK graduates (this is 17% of all retiring doctors, because UK doctor shortfalls started decades ago). This is the first number, since this supply will not be replenished. The UK has to make up that shortfall, noting that retirees will continue to retire.

For the second number, we look at the arrival rate of new consultants. It’s multiple pipelines. Around half of junior doctors quit after graduation (after the first 3 years). Thus never join the GMC register. That means of the 1,500, only 750 will stay to try to make their way to consultant stage every year. at best (assuming they don’t fail their exams).

You can see where we’re going with this. 1,026 retiring EU nationals –750 new UK doctors (at best)= 276 shortfall. Every. Single. Year! By the time another 14 years has rolled by, the shortfall is another 3,864 doctors bigger! That is assuming demand remains as it is today and we know that it won’t, since it increases year on year, especially as populations age. Given immigrants to the UK are relatively healthy, any exodus of immigrants will have little effect on demand, but significantly effect the NHS’ ability to serve.

This is what I mean by the government and civil service being mathematical illiterates. It starts at the bottom (arguably with the voters) and goes right to the top of government. The systemic effect of such action is rarely thought through. It needs expertise (Gove said we don’t) and skill beyond the average individual.