Nearly 9000 Irish medical professionals are registered in Australia as a mass exodus continues.
2,500 applications to work down under were made by Irish healthcare staff this year, up by 982 from 2021, according to the Australian Health Practitioner Regulation.
The Irish Medical Organisation is warning the HSE recruitment freeze will encourage new junior doctors to leave Ireland and will cause "dangerous conditions for patient care."
Junior doctors are threatening to ballot in the new year for industrial action to end the recruitment freeze.
Retired Consultant in Emergency Medicine, Cork based Dr. Chris Luke, says junior doctors have left Ireland for training in the past, but now they're emigrating right after qualifying:
"Our young medics are leaving almost within weeks of getting their license. In other words, at the end of their first intern year. That's a huge change. And I think that is where we need to start in terms of remedies".
