Confronted by a significant shortage of nurses across the country, the Government of Guyana is now looking to employ nurses from Cuba to meet the immediate needs of the country’s Public Healthcare Sector.

In making the announcement on Wednesday, President Irfaan Ali said he has already initiated talks with the Cuban Ambassador to Guyana, Jorge Francisco Soberón Luis.

“I had a long discussion with the ambassador, to see if we can get Cuban nurses to come into the system now, in the immediate period, to help to fill that gap because of the tremendous shortage that we have,” President Ali told reporters during a press conference on Wednesday.

Driven by the need for better salaries and working conditions, many Guyanese nurses are now opting to work in the United Kingdom and other developed countries. The move is taking a significant toll on the healthcare sector, with the country’s primer public health institution – the Georgetown Public Hospital (GPHC) – in need of hundreds of nurses.

 On Tuesday, President Ali met a group of nurses at GPHC, who explained that as result of the shortage, they are made to work long hours.

“Some of them are doubling up on shifts because of the shortage. When I spoke to the Administrator at the Georgetown Public Hospital, they now have hundreds of nurses short of their full complement,” the President said.

While the Government is looking to recruit nurses from Cuba to fill the existing gap, in the medium to long term, it is looking to redouble its efforts at training locals.

“The medium and long is to train, and retrain, and train more than the capacity that you need but the immediate term, for example, for nurses, is to have nurses come into the system from external sources,” he said.

The Government plans to further expand its Nursing Programme to cater for additional more nurses. It is encouraging persons with the basic nursing requirements to sign up for the Nursing Programmes.

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