Locally trained health care workers usually stay in Hong Kong for practice. Migration does not play a significant role in the availability of health care workers in Hong Kong. In particular for doctors, up to the end of 2018, overseas-trained doctors constituted 24.9% of the total doctor supply in Hong Kong. This proportion is expected to continue to shrink due to retirement or other reasons as the criteria for overseas-trained doctors to practice in Hong Kong had become very stringent since September 1996. Among the doctors in practice, the number of overseas-trained doctors who became qualified after 1996 (i.e., 506) is only one-sixth of that before 1996 (i.e., 3152) (Legislative Council Secretariat, 2019a). If the existing policy for overseas-trained doctor remains unchanged, locally trained doctors will continue to be the main source of medical practitioners in Hong Kong.

References:

Legislative Council Secretariat. (2019a). Admission of overseas-trained doctors in Singapore and Australia.  Retrieved from https://www.legco.gov.hk/research-publications/english/1819in13-admission-of-overseas-trained-doctors-in-singapore-and-australia-20190509-e.pdf.