Supporting health workforce recovery and resilience
Gaétan Lafortune, Noémie Levy
Abstract
The COVID‑19 pandemic has exacerbated pre‑existing health workforce issues in OECD countries, including shortages of doctors and nurses, insufficient investment in education and training, and retention challenges. These shortages have increased workloads and pressures. Many health workers have emerged from the pandemic exhausted and intending to leave their positions. This chapter reviews the health workforce capacity of OECD countries going into the pandemic and strategies used to mobilise additional health workers (surge capacity) to respond to peaks in demand during the absorb stage of the pandemic. It also reviews new strategies implemented by countries to increase health workforce capacity and flexibility in the recovery stage of the pandemic, to avoid future shortages and increase preparedness for future shocks. Addressing health workforce shortages calls for greater investment in education and training, increased staff recruitment to reduce the workload and pressure on existing staff, and increased retention rates by improving working conditions and pay rates for categories of workers that have traditionally been undervalued. At least half of all new investments needed to make health systems more resilient should be directed towards workforce training, recruitment, and retention.