UK cut health aid to vulnerable nations while hiring their nurses, research finds

The UK cut health aid to some of the world’s vulnerable countries at the same time as recruiting thousands of their nurses, in a “double whammy” for fragile health systems, new analysis has found.

The Royal College of Nursing (RCN), which carried out the research, said Labour had a “duty to fix” aid cuts imposed by the previous government, and to work on increasing the UK’s domestic supply of nurses.

Between 2020 and 2023, direct UK aid for health-related projects in “red list” countries – those with the most severe workforce shortages – fell by nearly 63%, from £484m to £181m.

Spending on projects designed to strengthen the healthcare workforce in those countries fell by 83%, from £24m to £4m.

At the same time, the number of nurses from these countries on the UK’s national register rose sharply. There were 11,386 registered in September 2020, and 32,543 in September 2024.

Professor Nicola Ranger, RCN general secretary and chief executive, said: “Cuts to aid may have been the previous government’s idea, but it is now this government’s duty to fix it.

“Recruiting heavily from the same countries from which we have deprived aid is a double whammy for some of the world’s most fragile healthcare systems. But it is also a damning indictment of successive governments’ unwillingness to properly fund and grow our own domestic nursing profession.”

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Source: The Guardian, 6 January 2025