NEARLY all 1,500 additional healthcare workers (HCWs) to be deployed overseas are expected to be nurses, according to the Philippine Overseas Employment Administration (POEA).
In a televised public briefing, POEA administrator Bernard Olalia disclosed that 99 percent of the healthcare workers to be deployed overseas are expected to be nurses.
“Only 1 percent are from other mission critical skills (MCS),” said Olalia.
In deploying them, the POEA chief said they will be prioritizing those that have already processed their employment documents.
“They are those that have already processed their papers, have employment contracts already, possess their working visas… We will already give them overseas employment certificates (OECs),” said Olalia.
This is in accordance with POEA Advisory No. 79-2021, which provides that healthcare workers recruited before June 2021 will be the ones deployed.
“Those HCWs falling under MCS with perfected contracts as of 31 May 2021, shall form part of this adjusted ceiling,” said the POEA.
The advisory also reiterated that HCWs under government-to-government labor agreements shall be allowed continued deployment as they are exempted from the deployment ceiling.
Similarly, the POEA said returning/balik-manggagawa HCWs shall still be exempted from the deployment cap.
The POEA reimposed the deployment ban for healthcare workers last June 1 after the annual 5,000 deployment cap set by the government was reached.
The Inter-Agency Task Force on the Management of Emerging Infectious Diseases last week approved the increase of the deployment ceiling to 6,500 healthcare workers.
