Dido Harding is wrong – the NHS would cease to function without foreign-born staff

We are lucky to have the skill and dedication of our international colleagues, and we welcome them as part of our NHS team, writes Dr Julia Patterson

Chairwoman of NHS Improvement, Dido Harding, has vowed to end the NHS’s reliance on foreign staff (AFP via Getty Images)

Dido Harding has made headlines for declaring that she wants to “make the NHS less reliant on foreigners”.

I think it’s important that we take a minute to reflect on who Dido Harding is speaking about when she talks about “foreigners”. Around 170,000 of the 1.28 million NHS staff working in the UK are on a visa; it takes up to 10 years to qualify for permanent residency in the UK.

Many of these staff members have trained at UK medical schools and universities. Others have been actively recruited from countries that can ill afford to lose their own staff. Our international colleagues travel to the UK to make careers, lives and homes here. They form an integral part of the NHS, and without their skills and dedication, the NHS would cease to function.