"Zimbabwe is the country hardest hit by brain drain on the continent, resulting in the loss of over 50 per cent of key professionals within the country's public health institutions," the Sunday Mail said.

It quoted a government-commissioned report as saying there had been an exodus of doctors, nurses, midwives and laboratory experts, seriously undermining the healthcare system, already overstretched by the AIDS pandemic.

The report said the two leading hospitals in Harare had 36 doctors working against 145 earlier.

It said there were 72 specialist consultants against the required 189.

There were no chief pathologists in either hospital.

Eighty-nine per cent of the laboratory positions and 44 per cent of the nursing positions were vacant, it said.

Health Services Board Chairman Lovemore Mbengeranwa attributed the exodus not only to Zimbabwe's 1 200-plus per cent inflation rate but also on poor working conditions, inadequate equipment and "overbearing bureaucracy."

"In the past, there was a set career pathway after training in which a health practitioner would follow moving from one level to the next," Mbengeranwa told the weekly.

"The solutions (to address brain drain) are there but we need only to know how to manage the situation."

Last month, Zimbabwe unveiled a 2,2-million-dollar fund to stem the exodus of skilled workers in the public sector.

The money is meant to be used to buy office equipment such as computers as well as cars for office use.

Around three million of Zimbabwe's 12 million population are believed to have left the country in the last seven years

Nampa-AFP

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