The Philippines produced a total of 37,098 new registered nurses in 2024.
However, there is no assurance that all of them will practice their profession, or that they will do so within the country.
The country is currently facing a growing shortage of nurses, partly due to slower production and partly due to nonstop overseas migration, Quezon City Rep. Marvin Rillo, vice chairman of the House Committee on Higher and Technical Education, said in a statement on Thursday.
“Largely due to the pressure to survive, some of them will likely try to seek immediate employment, even if it means taking on other jobs and not practicing nursing,” he said.
Rillo noted that in the past, many nurses ended up working as real estate agents, insurance agents, or car sales agents, while others pursued careers in business process outsourcing.
“We are not paying our new nurses enough to encourage them to practice their profession,” Rillo lamented.
The Philippines currently has a shortage of 127,000 nurses – a number expected to increase to 250,000 by 2030, according to the World Health Organization.
Data from the Professional Regulation Commission (PRC) showed that the 37,098 new nurses produced in 2024 was roughly the same as the 36,525 produced in 2023.
However, Rillo pointed out that these numbers are still low compared to the average of 63,800 new nurses the country annually produced more than a decade ago.
“We must invest more in our nurses if we want to retain some of them in the local health sector,” Rillo said.
Rillo also noted that a significant number of new nurses have already set their sights on overseas employment.
Rillo has filed House Bill 5276 which seeks to increase the basic monthly pay of entry-level nurses in government hospitals by 74 percent, or to P70,013 (Salary Grade 21).
Currently, entry-level nurses at Department of Health (DOH) hospitals receive P40,208 (Salary Grade 15) in basic monthly pay.
In the Senate, Senator Raffy Tulfo was pushing Senate Bill No. 2694 which seeks to increase the basic pay of entry-level nurses in public health institutions by 40 percent, or to P56,390 (Salary Grade 19).
Both bills seek to amend the Philippine Nursing Act of 2002.
