Papua New Guinea needs more nurses, doctors and community health workers to meet minimum global standards and to serve the growing population, a science conference in Port Moresby has been told.
It heard that because the population is expected to exceed nine million by 2030, the country requires more than 3000 doctors and 21,000 nurses to serve 80 per cent of the population. The UPNG School of Medicine and Health Sciences professor Nakapi Tefuarani said this yesterday while presenting his paper at the 6th research, science and technology conference at the university. He said PNG required an intake of 400 medical students per year so that by 2026, this would be 10 times more than the current capacity. "PNG’s health indicators are very low compared with the rest of the world therefore formidable increase in number of health workers must be trained and the government must look into developing the existing health facilities as much as possible. "PNG needs to continue to improve on its health indicators," he stated. He said the current workforce overview was shocking as a community health worker per 7000 patients and a nurse per 1300 patients while a health extension officer per 16,500 and a doctor per 15,500 patients. Currently there are two universities, Divine Word University and UPNG offering medical trainings with eight nursing schools and 11 community health workers (CHW) schools nationwide. Prof Tefuarani said the government must continue to allocate more funds for health professional training, medical research and medical institution infrastructure. "Medical training institutions must be funded to train more health professionals with more investment in local research that is relevant to Papua New Guinea," he said. He stated in his presentation that scenario five of national health workforce 2011-20 calls for more than 100 medical graduates a year. "To achieve this, there needs to be an expansion of tutorial rooms, laboratories and dormitory space, increase in staffing ceiling and constant funding from the government."
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