Unaffiliated MEP Luis-Vicențiu Lazarus (NI) has a position on the need to address the acute shortage of healthcare workforce and to ensure quality jobs in this sector, stating that the EU must take urgent and effective measures to attract and retain qualified healthcare staff, ensuring them decent working conditions and stable career prospects.

The full text of the views expressed by Luis-Vicențiu Lazarus (NI), an unaffiliated MEP, follows:

The European Union is facing an acute shortage of healthcare workers, a problem aggravated by an ageing population, difficult working conditions and the exodus of healthcare staff to countries offering more attractive salaries and benefits.

This is putting pressure on health systems in many countries, affecting the quality of care for patients and increasing the risk of collapse in key sectors such as long-term care.

The European Union must take urgent and effective measures to attract and retain qualified healthcare workers, ensuring decent working conditions and stable career prospects.

We are talking about a crisis which directly affects the health and well-being of European citizens: the acute shortage of medical staff. This is the result of bad political decisions and a lack of long-term vision.

For years, Member States have preferred to import medical staff from other countries instead of investing in training and retaining their own professionals. The consequence? Countries in Eastern Europe, including Romania, have been left without doctors and nurses, while Western health systems have relied on this forced migration instead of improving their own working conditions.

The solutions now being proposed are insufficient and sometimes absurd. There is talk of attracting labor from outside the EU, but we completely neglect the fact that even within the Union we have medical professionals who are overworked, underpaid and forced to work in inhuman conditions. Instead of looking for ‘quick fixes’ by importing workers, we should be investing in making the sector more attractive by offering:

Competitive wages to discourage the exodus of skilled staff

Safe and fair working conditions, including reducing excessive working hours

Real access to training and development programs

If we do not radically change our approach, the European Union will end up in a critical situation where health systems will collapse and citizens will suffer the consequences. We need a long-term strategy, not fire-fighting measures!

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