THE NUMBER of Slovak nurses caring for seniors in Austria has increased from about 6,000 in 2009 to about 16,000 now. Miloslav Bahna from the Sociological Institute of the Slovak Academy of Sciences presented the results of the Nurses 2011 research in late January, the SITA newswire reported.
Bahna ascribed the increase to the softening of restrictions that prevented some Slovak nationals from working in Austria until 2009 and the effect of the economic crisis on job opportunities in Slovakia. He admitted that before the change the number of Slovak nurses working in Austria might have been higher than was officially acknowledged.
Austria fully opened its labour market to citizens of the counties that joined the EU in 2004 only last year.
