Bangladesh to recruit another 2,000 doctors, 3,000 health workers to fight coronavirus

The government is hiring another 2,000 doctors and 3,000 medical technologists, technicians and radiographers to tackle an aggressive coronavirus outbreak in Bangladesh.

Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina approved the recruitment and the process of appointing medical technologists, technicians and radiographers has begun, Habibur Rahman, the director of management information system at the health directorate, told bdnews24.com on Thursday.

The recruitment will take May appointment counts for doctors and other health workers to a record 10,000.

Earlier, in the first week of May, the government recruited 2,000 doctors and 5,000 nurses to fight against the COVID-19 pandemic.

They have started working at COVID-19 hospitals across the country as the recruiting process ended a week ago, Habibur said.

Dhaka Civil Surgeon's office is providing them with training about the treatment of COVID-19 patients and hygiene protocols to keep them safe.

“The directorate is recruiting a record number of 10,000 doctors, nurses and health officials in a single month something the Directorate General of Health Services never experienced before,” Habibur said.

As many as 1,200 technologists, 1,650 technicians and 150 radiographers will be recruited to treat COVID-19 patients and they will be deployed in hospitals and medical laboratories once the situation becomes normal, he added.

The process of recruiting 2,000 doctors is also under way on orders from the prime minister, the health directorate official said terming the development "the biggest recruitment drive Bangladesh has ever seen”.

“We’ve received a signal. Our prime minister thinks a lot about the health sector and makes prudent decisions. She is giving us directions regularly perhaps because she believes the health sector needs to be more dynamic,” Habibur added.

Bangladesh recruited around 6,000 physicians earlier in 2014. Around 4,750 physicians were recruited last year.

There are 27,409 doctors among 78,300 staff in Bangladesh, according to data from the health ministry.

And the total number of registered nurses is 56,734, according to Bangladesh Nursing and Midwifery Council.