Patients will soon have to wait THREE WEEKS for a routine GP visit if the NHS doesn’t recruit 2,000 foreign doctors
NHS chief Simon Stevens warned they need to recruit foreign doctors on an "industrial scale" to plug critical shortages
DESPERATE NHS bosses want to hire 2,000 foreign GPs to plug critical shortages.
Simon Stevens admitted the health service must recruit overseas doctors on an “industrial scale” by 2020 to make it easier for patients to see a family medic.
Sick Brits currently wait an average of 13 days for a routine GP visit – up from ten days in 2015.
But medical leaders said this will “very likely” reach three weeks unless drastic action is taken.
Ministers want 5,000 extra GPs working in the NHS by 2020.
However, overall numbers are down by more than 500 since bosses pledged to tackle shortages a year ago.
Mr Stevens, the head of the NHS, said more overseas medics are now needed to plug the gaps.
Initially, bosses had intended to hire 500 GPs from New Zealand, Australia and the rest of the EU.
But in an interview with the Health Service Journal, Mr Stevens said practices in England need four times that amount.
An initial £30 million had been set aside to hire and train overseas GPs. It is unclear where extra recruitment cash will come from.
Mr Stevens said: "There are real pressures around retirements. So the conclusion we've come to is that in order to increase the likelihood of being able to have 5,000 more doctors in general practice, we are going to need... a significantly expanded industrial scale international recruitment programme.
General practice is currently under unsustainable pressure from rising patient demand, falling resources and widespread staff shortages
Dr Richard Vautrey
"Rather than the current 500 or so GPs that are being targeted for international recruitment ... it probably needs to be four times more than that, from international sources - [from the] rest of the EU and possibly New Zealand and Australia."
One scheme in Lincolnshire offered EU GPs a guaranteed salary of £90,000 and a “generous” relocation package to signup.
Mr Stevens would not be drawn on lifting the public sector pay cap. But said extra cash for NHS staff pay would have to come from central Government.
He said: "There's a sense of fairness across the NHS that it would be a good thing to do. But of course ultimately these are judgements that government has to make."
Commenting on the overseas recruitment drive, Dr Richard Vautrey, acting chairman of the British Medical Association's GP committee, said the policy was a “sticking plaster”.
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He said: "This announcement is yet another clear admission of failure from the Government, which is effectively conceding it cannot meet its own target of recruiting 5,000 extra GPs without an emergency draft of doctors from abroad.
"General practice is currently under unsustainable pressure from rising patient demand, falling resources and widespread staff shortages.
"We need a long-term solution. Applying a sticking plaster by recruiting doctors from abroad can only offer a limited short-term fix.”
Professor Helen Stokes-Lampard, chairwoman of the Royal College of GPs, said: “We welcome any GP from the EU or further afield who wants to work in UK general practice – as long as they meet the rigorous standards set by the College and General Medical Council to ensure safe clinical practice.”
Shadow Health Secretary Jonathan Ashworth said: “It is becoming harder to see a GP under this Government and more and more patients are unable to get an appointment at all.
“The most important thing is that the NHS is now able to get enough GPs in place to keep the service running safely.”
In May, a poll suggested GP vacancies were at their highest level ever as shortages hit crisis point.
Some surgeries have been forced to close or rely on pharmacists and paramedics as one in eight positions remained unfilled.
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