INDUSTRY experts on Tuesday warned of another looming exodus, this time, involving pharmacists who number only more than 4,000 at present.
In the next 10 years, the United States alone will need some 60,000 pharmacists, according to Yolanda Robles, president of the Philippine Association of Colleges of Pharmacy.
"It's already happening," Robles, dean of the University of the Philippines' College of Pharmacy, told reporters after a press conference in Quezon City yesterday.
In the last three years, she said UP lost 10 of its top pharmacy professors to higher paying jobs in the same field in the US and Canada.
Unlike doctors and nurses whose salaries here are much lower than what they could earn abroad, local pharmacists are not exactly saddled by a huge disparity in wage, she said.
a number of pharmacist, in fact, have salaries much higher than rates abroad largely beacause of training,experince and reputation they have all earned in the country. she said:
"If you look at the economic situation, professionals generally want to leave for the highest salary," Robles explained
First posted 05:44pm (Mla time) May 09, 2006
By Christian Esguerra
Inquirer
