62% Saudi employees in health centers

The number of Saudis in government-run nursing and primary health care centers stands at 62 percent of its total workforce, local media reported, quoting an official from the Health Ministry. Dr. Mohammed Ba-Sulaiman, undersecretary at the ministry, said the ministry is currently constructing some 1,671 medical centers, 50 percent of which are already operational. The ministry official, who was addressing the 30th meeting of the Gulf Cooperation Council nursing technical committee in Jeddah, said the ministry has nearly 1,000 medical centers in rented buildings. Despite governmental plans to shift the above centers from privately-owned to government buildings as quickly as possible, non-availability of lands constitutes a major problem to this drive. Development of health care centers remains one of the top priorities of the new minister, whose strategies contain a series of themes inducing the provision of family medicine specialists and supportive services to these centers, Ba-Sulaiman said. Dr. Munairah Al-Osaimi, another undersecretary at the ministry, stated that there was no big turnout in nursing careers from the Saudi cadres since other options in the labor market are viewed as easier than nursing. Al-Osaimi admitted that nursing is not considered an attractive profession by Saudis. The ministry is encouraging Saudis to join the nursing profession by providing a package of benefits and incentives as well as training opportunities. Experts and researchers have stressed that the health sector will need 40 years for complete Saudization of the nursing sector. -arabnews