“A Medical Carousel”: The Transnational Migration of Doctors in the post-WWII era
Status: This talk is in preparation - details may change
Status: This talk has been cancelled
In the decades following the Second World War, many countries of the Global North experienced two cardinal events in public policy: the construction of state-run health insurance systems and, secondly, the transformation of immigration regulations in order to prioritize highly-skilled professionals. These two initiatives triggered a substantial migration of health care practitioners from poorer to wealthier jurisdictions. By the end of the 1970s, industrialized countries were dependent upon the annual arrival of foreign-trained doctors and nurses, eliciting claims that this situation represented a massive, generational ‘aid in reverse’. This talk explores this transnational event from the perspective of the history of migration and the history of medicine. It also reflects on the legacy of what is popularly called the ‘medical brain drain’.

Speaker:
David Wright is Professor of History; Canada Research Chair in the History of Health Policy at McGill University, Montréal, Canada
Date: 5 March 2020, 11:00 (Thursday, 7th week, Hilary 2020)
Venue: 58 Banbury Road, 58 Banbury Road OX2 6QS
Venue Details: Centre on Migration, Policy and Society (COMPAS)
Speaker: David Wright (McGill University, Montréal, Canada)
Organising department: Centre on Migration, Policy and Society (COMPAS)
Organiser: William L Allen (COMPAS, Oxford)
Organiser contact email address: william.allen@compas.ox.ac.uk
Booking required?: Not required
Audience: Members of the University only
Editor: Belinda Clark