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Rumbidzayi zinyuke-Senior Health Reporter

The number of health workers who have left the public sector this year has declined by 47 percent from last year, owing to the monetary and non-monetary interventions introduced by the Government to stem the tide and improve the lives of health workers.

As at December last year, a total of 2910 health workers had left the public healthcare service for the local private sector as well as regional and international markets. However, the workers who had left the service as at November 4 this year currently stands at 1538.

Health Service Board acting executive director Mr Anglebert Mbengwa said it was highly unlikely for the numbers to exceed 2000 by the end of the year.

He said in the SADC region, most Zimbabwean health workers were being absorbed into South Africa, Botswana, Namibia and to a certain extent Zambia. The United Kingdom and Australia were the most common destinations for those moving into the international health sectors.

“While the market which was created by the advent of Covid-19 and was one of the triggers for staff movement is still there, as a country we have put in place mechanisms that have tried to stem the tide. We have a fairly stable health labour market at the moment owing to those interventions. We have not seen many departures. Instead, we have been seeing inquiries by those that have left the public health sector into the private sector in Zimbabwe and those that had completely left the service inquiring to come back and we are welcoming our professionals to come back into the sector,” he said.