A newly graduated doctor earns about 2,000 Egyptian pounds, or $120, a month, while a specialist who has an additional degree gets about 3,000 Egyptian pounds, or $180. The average monthly spending on all expenditures for an Egyptian family was about 3,058 pounds, or $183, in 2015, according to the latest figures available from the Central Agency for Public Mobilization and Statistics. (Those numbers were recorded before the devaluation of the Egyptian pound in 2016, and since then life has become much more costly for Egyptians paid in pounds.)

“I never regret my resignation from working in Egypt,” said Mustafa Abdel-Rahim, a pediatrician who now works in Kuwait. “The salaries are low, so the doctor works in clinics and private centers for 72 hours to meet his living and family needs, not to mention the lack of safety at work.”

Ahmed Refaat, a professor at Assiut University’s South Egypt Cancer Institute, agrees with Abdel-Rahim regarding the poor compensation for doctors and the lack of support for their role. “A professor at the Faculty of Medicine does not get more than 10,000 Egyptian pounds ($600), while a specialist in any Arab country earns ten times that salary,” he said. “And those who leave the country will never think of coming back.”

Those doctors who stay in Egypt often leave critical but stressful specialties such as general surgery, intensive care, anesthesia, emergency and heart surgery and move to specialties with easier hours and higher income, such as plastic surgery, gynecology or pediatrics.

This trend has resulted in a large deficit in certain specialties and surpluses of doctors in other fields. For example, the National Heart Institute recently announced it needed to appoint 50 doctors in anesthesia and 30 doctors in cardiac surgery. But only one doctor has applied for each of those departments.

“There is a severe shortage in the specialties of emergency medicine and intensive care, because doctors prefer to travel abroad, in addition to the lack of a law to evaluate medical errors, leaving doctors exposed to nonspecialized criminal trials,” said el-Tahir, the member of the Medical Syndicate Council.

Disagreement Over Solutions

Despite the agreement on the causes of doctors’ emigration, people disagree about the solutions.

Recently, the Egyptian government announced its intention to study the possibility of graduating an additional cohort from medical schools, as well as increasing the number of students admitted to medical schools. But many critics say these steps won’t solve the problem.

“It is not possible to provide suitable training if the number of admitted students increases,” said Mona Mina, a member of the Medical Syndicate Council. “The graduates will still need in-depth and detailed study to avoid further deterioration of health services.”

Samir, the cardiothoracic surgery professor at Ain Shams University’s Faculty of Medicine, also rejects the idea of increasing student numbers or medical colleges. “Our problem is not a shortage in medical graduates, but their emigration after graduation,” he said. “The working environment here is repellent to competent physicians and there must be a fair wage system and laws that protect doctors so they can improve their standard of living.”

Ahmed Said, an assistant professor of obstetrics and gynecology at Kasr Alainy School of Medicine, at Cairo University, does not seem optimistic about conditions improving for Egyptian doctors any time soon. He is preparing to take the second part of a British fellowship exam this year to get a chance to travel and work in England.

“Unfortunately, I was late to take this step,” he said, “I should have taken it six years ago. The situation is getting worse every day.”