Regret, return: the migration of doctors from Middle East conflict zones

In December 2024 Ghanem Tayara, a Syrian GP who was working for the NHS, returned home for the first time since 2013. Back then, Tayara was added to a list of exiled Syrians who would be arrested at the border by Shu’bat al-Mukhabarat al-’Askariyya, the military intelligence service that propped up the Ba’athist regime of dictator Bashar al-Assad. That regime, which for 13 years deliberately targeted healthcare workers, fell on 8 December 2024.1

Tayara recalls crossing the border back into Syria from Lebanon. “It was very emotional for me, the tears fell and fell,” he tells The BMJ.

Tayara is one of many migrant medics returning to Syria with the skills and motivation to help in the rebuilding of public infrastructure and civil society as a fragile peace unfolds. Health officials estimate that 30-60% of doctors had left the country since the beginning of the civil war.2 The fall of the regime has given them the chance to return home.

Yet for all the resources and expertise they bring back, returnees represent a tragedy for nations that face a medic brain drain in times of war.

From Syria to Gaza, Israel, Lebanon, and Yemen, healthcare workers have fled from nations in conflict and economic crisis in the Middle East, with the healthcare systems of richer nations—particularly the Gulf States—reaping the benefits.

The World Health Organization code of practice on the international recruitment of healthcare workers says that “member states should discourage active recruitment of health professionals from developing countries facing critical shortages of health workers.”3 A similar code of practice, listing 47 countries, was published by NHS Employers and …