Chiz: CHED decision ends fears of lack in nurses

MANILA, Philippines — Lifting the 11-year moratorium on undergraduate nursing programs in colleges and universities is seen to address the lack of health workers, Sen. Francis Escudero said yesterday.

Escudero, incoming chairman of the Senate committee on higher, technical and vocational education, said the Commission on Higher Education (CHED)’s decision to lift the ban will ensure that the country has sufficient medical frontliners in case of another global health crisis in the future.

“I welcome the decision of the CHED led by Chairman Prospero de Vera III to finally allow all higher education institutions (HEIs) to offer nursing courses. It is really about time, especially with the lessons learned from our handling of the COVID-19 pandemic,” he said in a statement.

“We are still in a pandemic and we will be needing more medical workers. That is why we have to start rebuilding our workforce now so we don’t have to go through the same harrowing experience should another health crisis come,” he added.

Last week, HEIs were allowed to submit their applications to CHED following De Vera’s announcement on July 13 that an en banc decision has lifted the ban after a “very thorough review based on an exhaustive discussion.”

The moratorium was imposed during the administration of the late former president Benigno Aquino III because of the oversupply of nursing graduates with over 200,000 unemployed nurses.

“This moratorium which was imposed in 2011 has been reviewed at the height of the pandemic when there were calls to lift the moratorium on nursing because of the perceived lack of nurses especially at the height of COVID,” De Vera said last Wednesday.

Aside from the perceived lack of health care workers, the commission lifted the ban due to unequal distribution of HEIs offering nursing programs across the country’s regions, like Region 13 (Caraga) where only three private HEIs offer nursing out of the total 333 institutions offering it nationwide.

Escudero said he intends to look at the current state of the country’s higher education when he assumes chairmanship of the committee in the 19th Congress.

“But we have to ensure that any reform we will have to initiate will be doable and sustainable in the long run,” he stressed.

In the 17th Congress, the senator sponsored Republic Act 10931, the Universal Access to Quality Tertiary Education Act, that allowed free tuition and other school fees in state universities and colleges, local universities and colleges accredited and recognized by the CHED as well as in state-run technical-vocational institutions.