KINGSTON, Jamaica - Jamaica's government on Monday said it expects more than 600 jobs will be available when it hosts the two-day Health & Wellness Career Expo & Employment Fair that gets underway on Wednesday.
The event is being organised by the Ministry of Health & Wellness in collaboration with the Ministry of Education, Skills, Youth and Information. It will be held at the Mona campus of the University of the West Indies under the theme “A Career in Health: Roadmap to Success”.
The ministry said the expo and job fair responds to prevailing challenges to human resources for health, including the limited availability of professionals for some specialist areas, migration and competition from overseas recruiters.
“This event will progress Jamaica’s journey to ‘ensuring human resources for health in sufficient number and competencies, aligned to the model of care and committed to the mission’ to safeguard the best possible health outcomes for all,” said Health and Wellness Minister, Dr. Christopher Tufton.
“As a Ministry of Health and Wellness, we are committed to getting ahead of the human resources for health challenges. The scale of this event and its prioritisation of the needs of students, career changers, jobseekers and others who are curious to find out what it takes to succeed in public health is a clear indication of that,” he added.
The ministry said that the two day event affords members of the public the opportunity to vie for the more than 600 job vacancies islandwide, noting that all categories of workers are required from records and research officers to monitoring and evaluation officers, drivers, office attendants and accountants, managers and directors in programme management, doctors, nurses, psychologists, health informatics pros and so much more.
It said in addition to the job opportunities, the event will showcase the range of career options as well as the different professional groups in health. Attendees will also have the benefit of enrichment sessions that feature, among other things, resume writing and how to finance a career in health.
The ministry said that participants will also be exposed to the Dr. Barrington Wint Scholarship, which makes available up to one million Jamaica dollars (One Jamaican dollar=US$0.008 cents) per recipient for up to five years.
Wint is a former chief medical officer and the scholarship is open to Jamaicans pursuing health studies.