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Journalism of Courage
If the trend in overseas recruitment is anything to go by, nursing is the most happening profession in Kerala for those eyeing a job in the West.
At least 14,000 qualified nurses from here are completing formalities to leave for US, Canada, England and Australia. Nearly 30 per cent of them belong to the State Health Service.
On an average, a hundred attestations are issued to nurses seeking employment abroad everyday at the Office of the State Medical Council Registrar here. Nearly 14,000 certificates were cleared in the last six months. Those queueing up at the Registrar’s office seeking clearance certificates include freshers, health service staff and nursing tutors.
According to Kerala State Medical Council Registrar P.G. Karthikeyan, the number of attestations has been on the rise. ‘‘The implications of this boom will be of far reaching consequences to the state health sector,’’ he said. One of the major reasons for this spurt, said sources, is the steep fall in the number of nursing students getting enrolled in these countries. Another reason is the strict enforcement of medical rules in the West which stipulates the patient-nurse ratio at 1:5.
