Give us our Doctors Back, Libya tells Canada; Specialty Training; Physicians opting to Stay Here Rather Than Return Home
Publication info: National Post [Don Mills, Ont] 13 Dec 2006: A9.
Abstract:
Doctors paid by Libya to get specialty training in Canada are staying behind in droves when they graduate, breaking agreements with their own government and causing “enormous harm” to the country’s health-care system, Libyan diplomats say in an unusual plea for help from Canadian authorities.
Libya doles out an average of about $500,000 each to have physicians trained at Canadian universities, but virtually 99% of the 30 or so doctors it graduates yearly in Canada are now choosing to practise here, the embassy said in letters to the colleges of physicians and surgeons.
“This situation has caused tremendous prejudice to the Libyan treasury and enormous harm to the Libyan health system.”
Full text:
Doctors paid by Libya to get specialty training in Canada are staying behind in droves when they graduate, breaking agreements with their own government and causing “enormous harm” to the country’s health-care system, Libyan diplomats say in an unusual plea for help from Canadian authorities.
Libya’s Ottawa embassy has asked medical regulators in each province to refuse to license such physicians, who are supposed to return home in exchange for having their specialty training funded by the government.
Libya doles out an average of about $500,000 each to have physicians trained at Canadian universities, but virtually 99% of the 30 or so doctors it graduates yearly in Canada are now choosing to practise here, the embassy said in letters to the colleges of physicians and surgeons.
“This matter has become of great concern over the last years as the number of doctors returning to Libya has decreased at an alarming rate,” Muftah Nagem, deputy head of the Liyban mission in Ottawa, said in his missive to the colleges of physicians and surgeons.
“This situation has caused tremendous prejudice to the Libyan treasury and enormous harm to the Libyan health system.”
When the colleges issue the physicians certificates to practice, it is “a licence to (flout) their legal obligations towards the Libyan government, ” Mr. Nagem wrote.
Most of the regulatory agencies say they have no choice legally but to welcome the Canadian-trained Libyan graduates, though they acknowledge the request puts them in a difficult position, forced to juggle between a foreign country’s justified grievance and the demands of domestic law in a system starving for doctors.
“It’s a real dilemma for the colleges,” said Dr. Colin McMillan, president of the Canadian Medical Association.
“[They] are under enormous pressure from the public and even the politicians in some of the provinces — when so many people don’t have family doctors — to do virtually anything to get someone licensed,”
The situation shines a light on the controversial program that sees close to 1,000 “visa trainees” — most from Saudi Arabia and other Middle East nations — get their residency training as family doctors and various other medical specialties at Canadian universities, with their home government usually footing the hefty bill.
Some critics have questioned in the past why Canada does not pay to fill those residency spots with its own physicians.
Yet Canada still seems to benefit from the situation, and Libya may not be the only country to suffering a brain drain. About 15% of international visa trainees who finished their training in 2004 were practising in Canada in 2006, according to the Canadian Post- M.D. Education Registry.
And 18% of those who graduated in 2000 were working here in 2005, the agency found.
In Ontario, the college of physicians and surgeons issued licences in 2005 to 11 Libyan-financed doctors after they finished their training in the province, said Jill Hefley, a spokeswoman for the regulator.
The Saskatchewan college has licensed a handful of such Libyan doctors, said Dr. Dennis Kendel, its registrar.
Nothing in the law allows the organization to deny certification to a physician because of an outstanding third-party contract, he said.
Newfoundland recently admitted to practice a Libyan doctor trained in Canada at his home country’s expense, who met all the province’s licensing requirements, said Dr. Robert Young, the college registrar there.
“We understand and have sympathy for the Libyan government,” he said.
“[But] we feel that this is a matter between the Libyan government and their doctors,” he said.
Unlike most of the other provinces, the Manitoba college says it might deny entry to a foreign-funded specialist if the person had breached a contract with their own government, said Dr. Bill Pope, the registrar.
“It shows that individuals who are expected to have the highest level of ethical responsibility may in fact not be prepared to carry out their commitments,” Dr. Pope said.
Neither an embassy official, nor Libya’s Ottawa-based lawyer were available for comment yesterday.