Department of Public Health, Institute of Tropical Medicine, Antwerp, Belgium.
Hum Resour Health. 2007 Jul 31;5:19. doi: 10.1186/1478-4491-5-19.
In this paper, we aim to quantify the contribution of international health volunteers to the health workforce in sub-Saharan Africa and to explore the perceptions of health service managers regarding these volunteers.
Rapid survey among organizations sending international health volunteers and group discussions with experienced medical officers from sub-Saharan African countries.
We contacted 13 volunteer organizations having more than 10 full-time equivalent international health volunteers in sub-Saharan Africa and estimated that they employed together 2072 full-time equivalent international health volunteers in 2005. The numbers sent by secular non-governmental organizations (NGOs) is growing, while the number sent by development NGOs, including faith-based organizations, is mostly decreasing. The cost is estimated at between US$36,000 and US$50,000 per expatriate volunteer per year. There are trends towards more employment of international health volunteers from low-income countries and of national medical staff.Country experts express more negative views about international health volunteers than positive ones. They see them as increasingly paradoxical in view of the existence of urban unemployed doctors and nurses in most countries. Creating conditions for employment and training of national staff is strongly favoured as an alternative. Only in exceptional circumstances is sending international health volunteers viewed as a defendable temporary measure.
We estimate that not more than 5000 full-time equivalent international health volunteers were working in sub-Saharan Africa in 2005, of which not more than 1500 were doctors. A distinction should be made between (1) secular medical humanitarian NGOs, (2) development NGOs, and (3) volunteer organizations, as Voluntary Service Overseas (VSO) and United Nations volunteers (UNV). They have different views, undergo different trends and are differently appreciated by government officials.International health volunteers contribute relatively small numbers to the health workforce in sub-Saharan Africa, and it seems unlikely that they will do more in the future. In areas where they play a role, their contribution to service delivery is sometimes very significant.
本文旨在量化国际卫生志愿者对撒哈拉以南非洲卫生人力的贡献，并探讨卫生服务管理者对这些志愿者的看法。
对派遣国际卫生志愿者的组织进行快速调查，并与来自撒哈拉以南非洲国家的有经验的医务人员进行小组讨论。
我们联系了 13 家在撒哈拉以南非洲拥有 10 名以上全职同等国际卫生志愿者的志愿者组织，并估计他们在 2005 年共雇用了 2072 名全职同等国际卫生志愿者。来自世俗非政府组织（NGO）的派遣人数正在增加，而发展 NGO（包括宗教组织）的派遣人数则大多在减少。每位外籍志愿者的成本估计为每年 36000 至 50000 美元。越来越多的国际卫生志愿者来自低收入国家，越来越多的国家医务人员也来自这些国家。国家专家对国际卫生志愿者的看法比积极的看法更为负面。他们认为，鉴于大多数国家都存在城市失业医生和护士，这些志愿者的存在越来越矛盾。大力支持创造条件，以雇用和培训本国工作人员作为替代办法。只有在特殊情况下，派遣国际卫生志愿者才被视为一种合理的临时措施。
我们估计，2005 年在撒哈拉以南非洲工作的全职同等国际卫生志愿者不超过 5000 人，其中医生不超过 1500 人。应区分（1）世俗医学人道主义 NGO、（2）发展 NGO 和（3）志愿组织，如海外志愿服务社（VSO）和联合国志愿者（UNV）。它们的观点不同，趋势不同，政府官员对它们的评价也不同。国际卫生志愿者对撒哈拉以南非洲的卫生人力贡献相对较小，未来似乎不太可能增加。在他们发挥作用的领域，他们对服务提供的贡献有时非常重要。
