Obama Expressed His Hesitation

The Wexler's proposed law is being opposed by work unions. The union leaders plan to destabilize efforts to produce a stable local workforce while reducing the nurses of other nations. The unemployment rate continues to rise in U.S. As a result, Obama expressed his uncertainty about the idea that U.S. needs to trade in nurses. In a health-care forum held last March, he said, "The concept that we would have to bring in nurses makes extremely no sense. A lot of people in US love to incline in that helping profession, and until now we aren't providing the means to get them trained, that's something we've got to fix." To focus on the shortages of health workers in the U.S., the $787 billion economic spur bill includes $500 million. About $100 million budget is allotted to support nursing and improve the facility at U.S. nurse-training schools.

The causes of nursing shortage are aging workforce, difficult working conditions coupled with stagnating pay, and a lack of capacity at U.S. nursing schools. According to Peter I. Buerhaus, professor of nursing at Vanderbilt University Medical Center, the downturn has alleviated the nurse dearth in some areas of the U.S. More Americans hunt for fields’ qualified job security. Some hospitals also perceive less want for staff as more Americans misplace health insurance and fewer people spend money on optional surgery and doctor visits.  By 2025, the nurse scarcity will be doubled after Congress passed the Medicare and Medicaid programs. This will be as stern as the last major shortage in the mid-1960s. Nine percent of the total registered nurse workforce was composed of foreign-born RNs in 1994. From Buerhaus' research, by 2008 this percentage had increase to 16.3 percent, or more than 400,000 RNs. From the 400,000 nurses, over 10 percent had immigrated to U.S. within the preceding five years. From 2001 to 2008, almost one-third of the increase in RNs was consisted of foreign-born RNs. [via Business Week]