KINGSTON, Jamaica. Friday, January 24, 2025: The curtains have come down on the inaugural Health & Wellness Career Expo & Employment Fair of the Ministry of Health & Wellness, with close to 10,000 Jamaicans having participated.
From the preliminary count, close to 3,000 persons (2,907) were screened for the available 600-plus job vacancies while close to 7,000 students and other members of the public (6,694) visited the displays.
Organised in collaboration with the Ministry of Education, Skills, Youth and Information from January 22 to 23, the Health & Wellness Career Expo & Employment Fair was hosted at The University of the West Indies, Mona, under the theme ‘A career in health: Roadmap to Success’.
The two-day event showcased the range of careers in the sector while affording members of the public the opportunity to access job vacancies islandwide.
The Career Expo & Employment Fair forms a part of the response to prevailing challenges to human resources for health, including the limited availability of professionals for some specialist areas, migration and competition from overseas recruiters.
“We had a very good event, achieving precisely what we intended to, with thousands of participants benefitting from the insights into the different careers in health, while also taking advantage of the opportunity to vie for the current vacancies in the system,” said Dr. the Hon. Christopher Tufton, MP, Minister of Health & Wellness.
“This initiative has no doubt helped to progress our journey to achieving goal four of the Vision for Health 2030 strategic plan for health: ‘ensuring human resources for health in sufficient number and competencies’,” the Minister added.
The Career Expo and Employment Fair coincided with the visit of Dr. Teodoro Herbosa, the Secretary of Health for the Philippines. His visit yielded a Memorandum of Understanding between the two countries that provides for faculty exchanges, as well as specialist training and knowledge and experience sharing in the areas of biotechnology, epidemiology, and healthcare management, among others.
“While discussions between sending and receiving countries have been taking place bilaterally among various countries, the need for a larger and inclusive dialogue [about human resources for health] has been evident for some time,” Secretary Herbosa noted, speaking at the opening ceremony for the expo and employment fair on Wednesday (January 22).
“Today, we bring this issue into the spotlight, bringing the discourse outside the confines of board rooms and meeting halls, and into a wider audience of health professionals, policymakers, young professionals and the next generation,” he added.
“For this, I would like to congratulate the Jamaican Government, especially the Ministry of Health and Wellness, for orchestrating this historic event,” Herbosa said further.
In addition to the various careers in public health, also on show at the Health & Wellness Expo and Employment Fair were the different professional groups in health, and the offer of enrichment sessions.