Morocco Opens Doors to Foreign Doctors Amid Critical Healthcare Shortage

This is what Health Minister Khalid Ait Taleb said in an interview with Reuters, stating that the severe deficit in practitioners, as well as their uneven geographical distribution across the territory, motivated this decision.

According to him, hospitals are suffering from an "acute shortage" of 32,000 doctors and 65,000 nurses, a number "that is difficult to train quickly because only 1,200 doctors graduate per year."

Meanwhile, the kingdom is fighting the Covid-19 pandemic, with a resurgence of Omicron variant cases. He also recalled the plan to universalize social coverage, which must be realized this year.

To remedy this, the government has considered salary increases for health personnel as part of efforts to keep doctors in the public sector and attract more foreign workers.