Unprecedented Figures of Overseas-Trained Doctors Departing the UK, Creating Major Healthcare Workforce Concerns
Record figures of internationally qualified physicians are leaving the UK, placing the NHS at risk of huge gaps in its staffing, with hostility towards migrants being cited for the exodus.
Significant Rise in Departures
Altogether, 4,880 physicians who trained in overseas departed from the UK during 2024 – a rise of 26% on the 3,869 who did so the year before – figures from the medical regulator reveal.
Healthcare executives, experienced physicians and the General Medical Council cautioned that increased criticism of and abuse directed at migrants in the UK was a major reason for the rise in foreign medics leaving.
Sector Leaders Voice Worry
“It’s really concerning that so many well-trained and much appreciated overseas physicians the NHS just can’t afford to lose are leaving in their large numbers,” said Daniel Elkeles.
“We wouldn’t have an NHS if we hadn’t for many years recruited skilled and valued individuals from all around the world. The variety of the NHS staff is one of its greatest assets.”
Dr Amit Kochhar stated: “Physicians who trained overseas have for many years constituted a substantial portion of the NHS staff, and medical care in the UK would have long since withered away without them.”
“But as we alerted last month, a ongoing trend of hostile language is causing many physicians with a migrant background considering if it is valuable to remain.”
Political and Oversight Reaction
The health secretary voiced alarm this month that NHS employees were bearing the brunt of a return to historical discrimination in Britain where it is “socially acceptable to be racist”.
The rise in overseas doctors quitting occurred alongside a levelling-off in the number arriving to work in Britain, the GMC’s annual report on the condition of medical education and work in the UK for 2024 showed.
Workforce Data and Trends
- Over twenty thousand who joined the UK physician database in 2024 were only a few more than the 19,629 who did so in 2023.
- This formed the lowest increase since 2020.
- The GMC’s findings have raised concern because the NHS is so strongly dependent on physicians from elsewhere – 42% of its entire medical workforce trained overseas.
“Overseas-trained physicians who have historically chosen to work in the UK could very possibly choose to leave if they feel they have limited career advancement here, or if the country seems less welcoming,” said the GMC’s chief executive.
“Any hardening of discourse and decline of support could damage the UK’s image as somewhere the brightest and the best from all over the world would want to work.”
Employment Challenges and Policy Impact
The plateauing in overseas physicians coming to the UK may be because such medics are having difficulty to secure employment, the GMC explained.
- Only one in eight who became registered in the UK last year “found a designated body” – that is, got a post within the NHS – within six months.
- That was down on the 20% who did so in 2023 and one in four in 2022.
The shortage in places available for early-career doctors to start specializing in their selected medical specialism has prompted the government to assign more of them to domestically qualified doctors.
But the GMC’s report alerts ministers that that strategy, allied to the difficulty of securing a job, may be ill-advised by deterring international physicians from moving to the UK.
“It is crucial that staffing policies across all four [UK] countries do not accidentally demoralise or drive out the talent on which our medical system depend”, stated Massey and the regulatory head.