For every 100 nurses under the age of 35 who started in New Brunswick in 2023, there were 62 other young nurses who left, according to a new report by an independent public-policy think tank.New Brunswick had the second worst retention of young nurses in the country, the Montreal Economic Institute, known as MEI, found. Only Newfoundland and Labrador lost young nurses at a faster rate, with 98 leaving the workforce for every 100 who joined. This was likely in part due to the end of many short-term travel nurse contracts during the COVID-19 pandemic, says the report titled The Evolution of the Nursing Supply in Canada.The national average was 40, based on the latest registration data available from the Canadian Institute for Health Information, collected from provincial and territorial regulatory bodies.Emmanuelle Faubert, an economist at the institute, wrote the report in collaboration with research intern Olivia Martiskainen.Faubert said the “exodus” of young nurses is concerning because it adds to the shortage of health-care workers and puts more pressure on an already-strained health-care system.Heavier workloads fall on the nurses who do stay “and so you end up with a lot of nurses burning out,” Faubert said.MEI economist Emmanuelle Faubert, the report’s author, says there needs to be a complete reversal in the exodus of nurses ‘if we want to maintain [a] health-care system that works and is able to treat patients.’ (Submitted by MEI)“You cannot expect a burnt-out nurse to provide the same quality of care simply because it’s physically not possible,” she said.“But at the same time, a burnt-out nurse … they can only maintain the same pace for so long until they simply leave. “And so this becomes a vicious cycle … and it just puts the whole health-care system in jeopardy long-term.”37% increase in ‘outflow’ since 2014Nurses are the largest group of regulated health professionals in Canada, with more than 450,000 members, the report released Wednesday notes. They work in hospitals, primary care centres and long-term care settings.Although New Brunswick’s “outflow” of young nurses did improve from 2022, when it stood at 80 for every 100, the latest figure still represents a 37 per cent increase since 2014, according to Faubert.More specific New Brunswick numbers were not included in the report, but Faubert told CBC News that in 2023, the inflow of nurses under 35 to the province’s health-care system totalled 804 and the outflow totalled 498. Some 3,334 nurses, including both employed and not employed, were eligible to practise in New Brunswick that year.Only two provinces showed an improvement in the outflow/inflow ratio during that nine-year period — B.C., which cut its turnover of young nurses by 50 per cent, to 27 for every 100, and Quebec, which dropped eight per cent to 37 for every 100, she said.Compounding the problem, Faubert said, is that the average age of nurses registered to practise across Canada is decreasing.In 2023, nearly 31 per cent were under 35, compared to about 28 per cent in 2014, meaning a larger proportion of nurses are now in this age group with a higher turnover rate than the general nursing population, she said.Nursing vacancies have tripled across the country in the past five years, jumping to more than 41,000 in 2023, from about 13,000 in 2018, according to the report. Meanwhile, the demand for health care is increasing, with an aging and growing population.Unsustainable lossesThe continuing loss of young nurses is unsustainable, Faubert said.“Let’s always remember that yes, nurses are essential to provide care, all levels of care, but also young nurses, nurses under the age of 35, they are the experienced nurses of tomorrow,” she said.“And so we need nurses to stay for now, yes, but also to make sure that we are able to maintain services later on.”Faubert believes there are several reasons nurses are leaving their jobs, based on a 2025 survey conducted by the Canadian Federation of Nurses Unions.More than a third of nurses reported working involuntary overtime in the past six months, six in 10 said they experienced some form of violence or abuse at work in the past year, and one in four show clinical signs of anxiety, depression or burnout.More privatization proposedFaubert proposes several possible solutions, including more privatization.“Essentially competition, what it does in the labour market is it allows employers to compete for employees and when there’s competition — we’ve seen it during the worker shortage — you have increased salaries, you also also have increased benefits and better working conditions,” she said.“But when you have a market that is very heavily controlled and managed by a single entity — monopolized by the government, for example — the market is not able to provide that balancing that would usually be done.”Allowing nurses to work for travel nurse agencies, private clinics, or telehealth companies would enable them to better control their hours and maintain a work-life balance, Faubert said. A nurse, it doesn’t matter where they work. They treat patients … they help patients. And that is what we need.- Emmanuelle Faubert, economist at MEIShe downplayed the suggestion it could lure more nurses away from the public sector, arguing it could help prevent burned-out nurses from leaving the profession altogether by providing another option for them.“A nurse, it doesn’t matter where they work. They treat patients … they help patients. And that is what we need.”Asked about New Brunswick’s experience with costly travel nurse contracts in 2022, when Canadian Health Labs charged about $300 an hour per nurse — roughly six times what a local staff nurse earns, Faubert said she favours a collaboration between the public and private systems.Other suggestions include leveraging artificial intelligence to reduce nurses’ workloads by automating administrative tasks and renegotiating union contracts to “reward skills and competence over seniority.”B.C. offers model for retentionNew Brunswick should also follow the lead of B.C. — the province with the lowest ratio of young nurses leaving and the province most improved over 10 years, Faubert said.She pointed to B.C.’s shift-swapping pools, which allow nurses to trade shifts without administrative approval.In 2022, the British Columbia College of Nurses and Midwives also streamlined the accreditation process for internationally educated nurses, Faubert said.The “triple-track” assessment allows them to submit a single application for three nursing designations: registered nurse, licensed practical nurse, and health-care assistant. This reduces costs and potential delays of having to start the application process all over again for a different designation if they’re unsuccessful for a particular one, she said.In addition, the B.C. government has launched BCHealthCareers, which provides recruitment services and information to international health-care professionals, including personalized support to navigate the licensing, job search, and relocation process.CBC News has requested interviews with the New Brunswick Nurses Union and the Department of Health.
62 young nurses leave N.B. for every 100 who start, think-tank says
