Thursday, 02.28.08
Need a Lawyer, Stat
Photo by Brent Stirton/Getty Images
Third World Britons
26 February 2008
Overdosed
December 2007
Shannon Brownlee argues that America already has too many doctors.
Sub-Saharan Africa has it bad. The Lancet notes that it "carries 25% of the world's disease burden yet has only 3% of the world's health workers." The doctors tend not to get paid on time, and they often have to fight the world's ghastliest diseases with the medical equivalent of bows and arrows. A tropical disease specialist in London once advised his patient to save airfare: rather than visit the Congo, he said, just open your mouth and leap into a cesspool.
But this is no "international crime," and the invocation of that vague and misleading category in this case deserves our scorn and derision. The situation is at best much more complex, morally, than the authors let on, and it may well be exactly the opposite of what they argue. Would any of these poached doctors have even trained to become doctors, if their future consisted of a lifetime of not being paid by the Zambian government? How many Africans aspired to be doctors and improved themselves, even though they never got into medical school?
Lastly, the irony of constructing nitpicking theoretical arguments about "international crime" exposes the sad, creeping dilution of that phrase, not that it was ever a strong brew to begin with. Africa is a continent rife with real cases of repugnance, and some of the repugnance spills across borders. Better that we save that phrase for when the machetes come out.
Save our docsThe Lancet calls for "enforced regulation" of African doctors' migration. |
State ChattelEugene Volokh argues that the logic behind criminalizing doctor recruitment effectively reduces doctors and nurses to government property. |
Importers, stop yourselves!Stuart Rennie sympathizes with the doctor crisis but thinks the solution lies with national law, not international courts. |
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Yes, I agree- we wouldn't want our international prisons filled with rich white men. Its best to keep the term "international crime" uncorked, in the cellar.
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The Current authors have distinctive voices and that's part of the fun of reading them, so I hope this problem will be fixed soon.
"International crime?" Ridiculous. There's a reason why those African doctors and nurses come to Western countries to live and work - they can live as free citizens, protected by the rule of law, and be fairly remunerated for their labor. Many of them not only work in the West, but were trained here too - because the facilities in their own countries were either inadequate or inaccessible due to corruption and mismanagement.
As a former Peace Corps volunteer in Central Africa, I find these white guilt pieces exasperating. Brain drain is tragic, but it is not, by far, the greatest obstacle in the path of African development. Rather, it is kleptocratic, aloof and/or incompetent regimes that control many of those countries. Focus all the "international crime" hokum on that.
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Well I have an idea but I'm sure there are problems with it, can someone point them out to me?
What if we established American run & staffed hospitals and pharmaceutical & medical equipment plants in targeted areas in Africa? Mini Health Oases that create jobs and invest in local human capital. We can make them teaching institutions and train local doctors to American techniques etc while creating the drugs and equipment they need and building the infrastructure to make more. Not to mention that available health care and jobs would hopefully spawn thriving business sectors around them.
Sure, it would be a big initial investment, and would require American aid over time. But I have to imagine that a few days/weeks worth of Iraq money could fund a few installations like this for 10 years.
So where am I mistaken?
Posted by Jordan Weber-Flink | February 28, 2008 9:47 PM