Munich (dpa / lby) – In Bavaria, significantly fewer people started training in nursing this year than in 2021. The number has fallen from around 7,600 to around 6,500, said the managing director of the Bavarian Hospital Society (BKG), Roland Engehausen, on Friday at a general meeting in Munich. The decline by more than a tenth was “catastrophic”.
The lack of nurses is one of the core problems of many hospitals, said the BKG managing director. Many beds could not be occupied because there were no nursing staff. The decline in the number of trainees could be related to the corona vaccination requirement in health facilities. But above all, the image of care has deteriorated significantly, said Engehausen: “We write down care.”
Bavaria’s Health Minister Klaus Holetschek (CSU) admitted that image campaigns have not had the desired effect so far. More needs to be done to improve working conditions in nursing. When it comes to reconciling family and work and reliable duty rosters, everyone involved needs to do more.
In the summer, the Federal Statistical Office published figures according to which the number of people starting nursing training nationwide increased in 2021. At the time of publication, however, this increase had already been overtaken by the current development this year, according to the BKG. There are also reports from other parts of Germany of falling training numbers.
