TIMES: DOCTOR SHORTAGE THREATENS OBAMA'S HEALTH CARE REFORM PLANS

Universal health care does not just mean that every American has health insurance. It also means that they have access to doctors and nurses. And right now there are dire shortages in both fields. I've posted articles here on the nurse shortage (and you can see a lot more of my writing on this subject at my health care immigration blog at http://www.visalaw.com/blog_hc/blog_hc.html). Today's front page of the New York Times has a story describing the White House's worry that the physician shortage (which could reach more than 150,000 by the end of the next decade) could hamper efforts to extend health care to all Americans.

Senator Conrad's S.628, a bill introduced last month, would do a great deal to help get doctors to the worst medically underserved areas. Hopefully, legislators will remember that RN and MD visas are a health care issue as much as an immigration one.

Comments

[Nurse]

http://www.tennessean.com/article/20090426/BUSINESS01/904260341/1003/NEWS01

Good article about waiting for nurses. It says in the article about introduction of nursing relief this week. Don't know how true it is!!!!!

[Geroge Chell]

whenever i try to think the anti-immigrants are not that bad, i always get some contradiction [sic]...

Asian American actors have been protesting the lack of role for Asian Americans for many decades, and we have a large influx of European, Australian, New Zealand, Canadian and even white South African actors in Hollywood each year. If FAIR, CIS, Kirkorian and Stein are fare they would be protesting the lack of role for Asian American actors in Hollywood and would say that they should be hiring Asian American actors over foreign European actors. I am not saying that this should be the case. Hollywood goes where the market is and if the predominantly white American audience wants only white actors, that is what Hollywood would hire. Similarly for the tech companies..if they think the Asians produce the best they will hire Asians. However, what I want is balanced attack..and you dont get this from FAIR or CIS. They keep their trap shut when a profession imports a lot of whites, and get all worked up when a profession imports Asians or Hispanics..thus by deduction one can conclude that the goal of CIS and FAIR is to keep America white..and this is further confirmed by their lack of protest about jobs being shipped abroad..low wages become an issue when dark skinned immigrants move to this country, if they are paid even lower wages by jobs moving to them these groups dont protest...so much for protecting the American workers...it is all about keeping America white..it does not take a rocket scientist to deduce this..based on this observation, they would not mind if 95% of the doctors migrating are Germans or even Armenians and Georgians...they have a problem becuase the potential doctors are Indian, Japanese, Chinese, Korean, etc. I rest my case!

http://www.imdiversity.com/villages/Asian/arts_culture_media/quill_asian_TVa_0805.asp

[Legal-immigrant]

"...to keep America white."

whenever i try to think the anti-immigrants are not that bad, i always get some contradiction [sic]...

[Geroge Chell]

"Looks like, throughout the history, anti-immigrants' real intentions are always some thing else."....

...to keep America white. Anti-catholic bias exists no more as long as they happen to be white. That is why no protest against immigration of foreign actors who are mostly from the UK or Australia or for that matter against foreign fashion models (the industry is mostly white). That is why no protest against outsourcing of jobs to protect Amrican workers from CIS or FAIR, but plenty of talk about protecting Americans from immigrants.

[Legal-immigrant]

I was reading wikipedia about Mr.Morse and came across this:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Samuel_F._B._Morse#Anti-Catholic_and_anti-immigration_efforts

Looks like, throughout the history, anti-immigrants' real intentions are always some thing else.

[Geroge Chell]

You want to nail the antis. Here is how you do it. First collaborate with the AARP and those who are over fifty should join it..it is very cheap to be a member. Then run this commercial in specific districts, particularly the GOP districts in Florida: "Doctor and nurses shortages will drive up the wages of these professionals, drive up the medical care costs, put the health care facilities on the road to bankruptcy, pass costs on to insurance corporations who will promptly drop the seniors from the rolls and leave them without medical care. And this is the goal of not only the nurses union but also folks such as Mark Kirkorian and Dan Stein and organizations such as CIS and FAIR, when they say they need to increase (or double) the salaries of US nurses. The only thing that needs doubling is the number of nurses let into this country and the number of nurses trained by our institutions. For the sake of the health of the seniors, write to your congressman and tell them not to double health care costs but to double the number of medical personnel." In other words, scare the hell out of the seniors and turn them against the nurses union and anti-immigration groups!

[Smita, RN]

I agree with you Jim. Hope the US politicians realize that even their neighbouring country Canada is now offering permanent residence to those RNs working in USA on H1B visa. Only precondition is one year of US work experience. Many International Nurses having passed NCLEX exam have already gone to Ireland, Australia, New Zeland and Canada. Only time will tell how many nurses will now be available to come to USA even if a bill is passed. The congress very well verify from the NCSBN or Pearson Vue that number of International Nurses taking NCLEX RN exam has drastically reduced compared to corresponding period last year.

At least 50% of RNs working in USA now on H1B visa will migrate to Canada, thus creating more shortage of Nurses in US.

[Jim]

And I hope that this Swine flu scare is the final wake up call to politicians and unions. If the world is lucky enough that this new scare doesn't become a pandemic, another strain will re-surface in a few years time.

US needs all the physicians and RNs they need.

Stop thinking of selfish protectionism and political reasons for awhile and start thinking of the patients, specially the elderly and the children.

[Jim]

Finally, they recognize the physician and nurse shortage.

Hope, they do something about it.

All these healthcare reforms, mandatory nurse-to-patient ratios in hospitals and especially the universal health care would only mean more responsibilities to MDs and RNs. Problem is there is not enough MDs and RNs.