CANADA should compensate South Africa for “looting” the country?s doctors, says the head of the SA Medical Research Council, Malegapuru William Makgoba.
Under an international “code of ethics” advocated by Dr Makgoba, rich countries like Canada would be required to pay for every doctor they recruit in South Africa.
“It’s a new form of looting that we need to address from a principled position,” he told reporters. He would raise the issue at an upcoming meeting with members of Canada’s Royal College of Physicians and Surgeons.
Indirectly supporting Dr Makgoba’s concerns, the Canadian Medical Association Journal notes in an article that nearly one in five of doctors practising in Saskatchewan province earned their first medical degree in South Africa.
And South African-trained Martin Vogel is president of the 1530-strong Saskatchewan Medical Association’s president. Dr Vogel says he and his family emigrated because of violence.
Pretoria’s high commissioner, Andre Jaquet, recently asked each of Canada’s 10 provinces to refrain from recruiting South African doctors, nurses, pharmacists and other trained medical professionals. All responded but only one province, Nova Scotia, made a firm commitment to comply with Mr Jaquet’s request.
In Ottawa to deliver a speech at a Black History Month event, on African efforts to achieve economic and cultural renaissance throughout the continent, Dr Makgoba said rich countries should be encouraging “developing nations to develop (and not) pillaging their resources of development, which is human capital.”
It was “like having a banker who is a thief,” he said.