Govt to raise age limit for nursing entry

In an effort to deal with the critical shortage of nurses, government has agreed to amend the Nursing and Midwife Registration Regulation to raise the age limit for enrollment into the nursing profession from 35 to 45 years. This was announced Thursday by Health Minister John Rahael at a post-Cabinet news conference at Whitehall. The minister explained that anyone between the ages of 17 and 45 can now apply to the Nursing Council, and all other institutions where nurses are trained. Rahael also disclosed that Cabinet had appointed retired Industrial Court judge Gladys Gaffoor to chair the Commission of Inquiry into the health sector. He announced that Cabinet had agreed to the introduction of a one-year in-service training programme for pharmacy assistants. There would be an annual intake of 50 trainees over a four-year period, totalling 200 trainees over the entire period.

The pharmacy assistants would assist in the preparation and compounding of prescriptions, medications and orders; receive, check and store stocks; check for the expiration dates of all pharmaceuticals and assist in entering prescription orders into the information system. He said this was being done to ensure that the public health system was being provided with all the required personnel. Rahael expressed confidence that negotiations with the senior doctors would be concluded by the end of next year, forestalling any plans by the doctors to take industrial action. Rahael said the ministry’s team was currently in the Phillipines recruiting over 100 nurses, 50 pharmacists and specialist doctors for the public health sector.