Australia and New Zealand's contribution to Pacific Island health worker brain drain

Objective: The paper aims to quantify Australia and New Zealand's contribution to the brain drain of Pacific Island health workers and to contribute firm evidence to the ongoing, highly-contested health professional migration issue. Methods: The study uses the Australian and New Zealand 2006 census data to examine the number of Pacific Island born health professionals living in Australia and New Zealand and uses World Health Organization data to compare it against the numbers of health workers in Pacific Island countries. Results: Six hundred and fifty-two Pacific Island born doctors and 3,467 Pacific Island born nurses and midwives are working in Australia and New Zealand, more than half of whom are from Fiji with significant numbers from Papua New Guinea, Samoa and Tonga as well. There are almost as many Fiji-born doctors in Australia and New Zealand as there are in Fiji. There are more Samoa, Tonga and Fiji-born nurses and midwives in Australia and New Zealand than in the domestic workforce. Conclusions: Migration of Pacific Island health professionals to Australia and New Zealand is very high and contributes to the shortage of health workers in Pacific Island countries. Implications: Australia and New Zealand are encouraged to actively address the issue in collaboration with Pacific Island partners with a number of solutions proposed.