71 percent of health workers in Turkey want to go abroad: Survey

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Some 71 percent of health workers in Turkey want to go abroad and 87 percent want to work in other professions, according to a survey conducted by the Health and Social Services Workers’ Trade Union (SES).

The results of the survey were shared by the public on May 13 during a press conference held at the union's headquarters in Ankara.

SES co-chair Hüsnü Yıldırım said that 2,063 people participated in the survey. He recalled that the poverty threshold for a four-member family was 17,340 liras in April 2022 whereas the poverty threshold was 5,323 liras. “But, 60.11 percent of health workers earn a salary between 7,500-10,000 liras,” he said.

“Some 33.49 percent of health workers are undecided about going abroad, whereas 70.7 percent are thinking about going abroad...Some 85.46 percent of health workers will go abroad should they find an opportunity,” he said.

"Some 86.86 percent of health workers want to go into other professions if they had a chance. Some 92.31 percent of technicians, some 92.06 percent of clerks, 91.92 percent of nurses, 88.39 percent of midwives and 79.55 percent of doctors have expressed their wish to quit the profession should they find another opportunity,” he said.

Some 99.56 percent of health workers are not happy about Turkey's economic situation, with a majority of them saying “My purchasing power decreased considerably” and “The economy could not have been managed in a worse way.”

Asked why they were not satisfied with their jobs, many of the health workers cited the following reasons: “Economic reasons, heavy workload, mobbing, oppression, physical, psychological and verbal violence, arbitrary implementations of superiors, working conditions and a lack of vision in profession regulations.”