1204 



The National Advisory Commission on Health Manpower appointed 

 by President Johnson in 1965 made an estimate of comparable costs 

 for the United States to replace FMGs who had been licensed during 

 1961 and 1965. The estimated minimal cost was said to be somewhere 

 between $855 and $925 million.s"^ 



At a conference on brain drain sponsored by the State Department 

 in 1966, Dr. Kelly West discussed the role of FMGs in American medi- 

 cal research, noting particularly the fact that about three-fourths came 

 from the LDCs and that their immigration accounted for 18 percent 

 of annual additions to American manpower. To underscore the heavy 

 U.S. dependency on FMGs, he stated that to produce the professional 

 manpower equivalent in this country from native stock the United 

 States would have had to build and operate about 12 medical schools 

 at an operating cost of some $8 million a year for each medical center. 

 "In other words," he said, "the value of this migration may be esti- 

 mated at something of the order to us of $100 million per year, which 

 exceeds somewhat the total value of our foreign aid in the medical 

 field." ^"'^ 



In 1969, Dr. West was quoted as saying that the annual immigra- 

 tion rate of M.D.s exceeded 2,000, that these immigrants constitute 

 about 16 percent of the entries into the American medical profession, 

 and that it would require 16 new medical schools to produce the equiv- 

 alent number of M.D.s now supplied by imported manpower. ^''^ 



The PAHO report also portrayed investment losses to Latin 

 America in terms of costs to the United States in producing the 

 equivalent manpower resource. The report noted that every year 

 some 300 physicians emigrate from Latin America to the United 

 States. This number, it said, is equivalent to the annual output of 

 three large American medical schools and would cost at least $60 mil- 

 lion to build three teaching medical centers and more than $15 mil- 

 lion a year to operate them. "In these terms," the report concludes, 

 "the value of the physicians coming to the United States is roughly 

 equal to that of all U.S. medical assistance to Latin America." ^°^ 



Stevens and Vermeulen make similar parallel comparisons in their 

 study on FMGs in the United States in an effort to indicate invest- 

 ment losses to the LDCs. In 1971, India lost 821 physicians who estab- 

 lished permanent residence in the United States. This was the equiva- 

 lent of graduates from 8 or 10 American medical schools.^"' They also 

 cited a United Nations study which calculated that the Philippines 

 contributed $1.5 million to the U.S. economy annually, the estimated 

 annual cost of a loss of one-fourth of all physicians. An Indian study 

 estimated that the long term capital investment of a donor country 

 in 1,000 M.D. emigrants (rather less than the number of Indian M.D.s 

 entering the United States in 1971) is as much as $35 million, taking 

 into account their economic potential.^''^ 



^' Stevens and Vermeulen, op. clt., p. 68. 



^ Department of State, Proceedings of Workshop on the International Miffration of 

 Talent and Skills, October 1966, p. 40. 



606 Adams, Talent That Won't Stay Put, p. 79. 



609 Report on Brain Drain from Latin America. Pan American Health Organization, 

 1966, p. 16. Dr. Kldd discusses the loss to Latin America In Hearings, Senate Judiciary 

 Committee, International migration of talent and skills, 1968, p. 77. 



607 Stevens and Vermeulen. op. clt., p. 70. 



608 Ibid., p. 8. 



