THE EDITOR, Sir:
I LISTENED intently to part of the speech given by the new Minister of Health on the evening news of April 8 and the soundbite stressed money from the National Health Fund for education of new nurses.
It seemed to be a good thing, but I have a few questions about it. Are we going to train more nurses so that in a few years after graduating from nursing school these nurses leave for the greener pastures of North America and the United Kingdom due to the lack of adequate pay and poor working conditions?
Wouldn't it make more sense to adequately increase the income of our nurses and improve their working environ-ment so that they will want to stay and we may even attract other nurses to come to Jamaica?
The only people who are affected by these 'stop gap' methods are the public who have to deal with the inadequacies in our medical system and not due to a fault of theirs but rather the fault of our elected leaders. As long as we continue to address problems in this manner, the problems will never be adequately fixed.
I am, etc.,
DR. KEVAN SMITH
2k2115@yahoo.com
Kingston 6
