Harriet Wilde

We would be even more on our knees than we already are.

One of the things that really struck us about the survey was

how doctors who had been here for some time saw an erosion in the health care system that they arrived into.

So when they came here, they found that they felt privileged to be here and privileged to be working in such a system.

And now they see a system that is

underfunded and increasingly run down and it doesn't have the resources needed to treat the needs that they see every day.

So that was a real shift and it wasn't one that we expected.

There's currently about 20,000 odd on the register in New Zealand.

That's GPs and specialists at all levels, including trainees.

But there's about 8,000 overseas or international medical graduates working in New Zealand at the moment.

Something that we saw from our survey is that the quality of life, the work-life balance and New Zealand's environment are major drawcards to bring doctors from all over the world to Aotearoa, but also political differences are

And it's no secret that when elections have happened in the US, there's tended to be a spike in Americans looking at places like New Zealand.

And that's across all professions, not just the health sector.

It seems to be more popular, but the greatest number of doctors coming

that do come to New Zealand tend to be from the United Kingdom.

Yeah, and our survey, I think that tracks with doctors from the UK tend to be one of the biggest countries and providers of doctors here.

But the Medical Council data is looking at doctors across their whole careers.

So that's doctors who are freshly graduated and maybe looking to do a bit of an OE right through to

the senior medical officers and consultants that our survey covered.

I think it is a lifestyle.