Nursing sites and experts in the U.S. talk all of the time about the shortage of nurses and the pending nursing workforce crisis in the U.S. This article from Australia points out that this is a worldwide problem that has many regions working on their own solutions.

The Australian Nursing Federation reports that nurses down under are working longer hours and the average age nurses is increasing annually. The ANF also says that more than 50,000 nurse are registered but are not working in the nursing field.

The long and the short of this story is that around the world, the nursing workforce is getting closer to retirement age, working longer hours, and many are leaving traditional nursing venues for less difficult pastures. This trend is happening across many critical professions, both inside and outside of health care.

The world is facing workforce shortages of Teachers, Paramedics, Nurses, and more. While some of these jobs vacancies can be filled by providing lesser trained assistants to the remaining workforce (CNAs, EMTs, Educational Assitants, etc.), there will come a point where the trained workforce will not be adequate to fulfill these vital roles unless funding for education and career outreach in our schools.