Overwhelmed hospitals in the Philippines hit by staff resignations

Exhausted by the COVID workload, Loui quit her job as an intensive care unit nurse at a private hospital in the Philippines earlier this year.

The 30-year old, who declined to give her last name for fear of reprisals, is among thousands of medical workers who have resigned during the pandemic, complaining of low pay and poor working conditions. Others have sought better jobs abroad.

“We can’t even take a proper day off because we are often called back to cover for other staff who were in quarantine or resigned,” said Loui, who was earning 20,000 pesos (US$394) a month, including overtime, before she quit in March.

Hospitals fear the desertions have reached a critical point just as the Delta variant sends the number of cases soaring, as it has done elsewhere in Southeast Asia and worldwide.

The Private Hospitals Association of the Philippines (PHAPi) estimated that 40 per cent of private hospital nurses resigned last year, but more followed new waves of infections this year. Public hospitals are facing similar challenges.

“If we want to increase bed capacity, that is easy, but the problem is the nursing component,” PHAPi’s president, Jose Rene de Grano, told Reuters.

More than a year and a half into the pandemic, reported coronavirus infections in the Philippines have soared to more than 1.75 million, the second highest in Southeast Asia, while deaths exceed 30,000.