Where have all the vets gone?

People who voted for brexit to “take back our borders” and “stop them immigrants stealing our jobs” are learning the hard way that they should have listened to those who pointed out how we needed these foreign workers. They’ve all gone home where they’ll be appreciated and not have to deal with the racism they got here on a regular basis.
Temporary visas won’t help, who in their right mind would come here to be treated like shit for a few months then kicked out again?
However the majority of people voted for brexit, it’s been made worse by covid, but now we all pay the price with staffing issues everywhere and shortages of things on the shelves.
Now Britain needs to go back to being self sufficient, we need all the little farmers who were done out of business by the massive commercial farms, back and selling their produce, growing food for us here rather than for export, small local owned businesses need to come back. We need our factories back, we need to build or buy back the businesses that tidies have sold off over the last thirty years.
I don’t know what’s going to happen, I can’t see us thriving for a large number of years. I can’t see an end to all the problems caused by outsourcing and selling everything off to the big commercial giants.

Our pets' practice and hospital has always had loads of EU vets; same with a large, very well-thought-of, high tech hospital they sent us to earlier this year. I wasn't aware of a vet shortage. In fact, I've just made an appointment an hour ago for this morning.

Just phoned for an appointment today at our vets. None available this morning, but 5.40 pm tonight. Coastal practice.

I agree about vet's practices now being bought up by large companies Nezumi but at least they keep going that way.
We have an excellent veterinary practice owned and run by a Spanish couple but they say if Le Penn wins the election they will return to Spain. Hopefully that's unlikely.

Covid is also causing a problem. My friend's daughter is a small animal vet at a three vet practice, she currently has covid, caught from a vet nurse who is an anti vaxxer. She is off for 10 days for the second time as she had to self isolate a couple of months ago. They do their own out of hours so it puts huge pressure on the practice especially as she is not the only one ill. The husband and sister of the anti vaxxer are both very ill in hospital and now wishing they had all been vaccinated!
fwiw the entry requirement for vet school are the same as for medics. I use an equine hospital for my horses, it is one of the most dangerous jobs that you can do, most equine vets have at least one serious injury in their careers.

I had noticed all our vets near here had been bought by corporations. That rarely helps. Same for GPs & care companies (rarely helps in those cases either).

We have Animal Trust here in West Yorkshire and all the vets appear to be locums, so no continuity for your pet although they do their best. I wish I could have someone like Peter Wright from the Yorkshire Vet, lovely man but too far to travel.

I think vets must be pretty bright. They treat all kinds of animals, but hardest of all the patient can't describe what is wrong with them and where it hurts. The vet needs to be very skilful at diagnosing the problem.

ninathenana

JaneJudge I wouldn't say exceptionally bright. Fairly intelligent would describe the vets in the practice where I worked for 10 yrs.

Where are you experiencing petrol queues ?

To get into vet school you need 3 “A” s at A level and are 100% oversubscribed, so pretty bright. Large animal work is hard, small animals easier and more lucrative.

Oh Scones, my husband said the same as I actually spoke to him later in the day I do need to fill up again.....

I think that what foxie48 said about big corporations buying out practices is right. The same is true of opticians I believe. We are ok with the vet at the moment but we are having the devil of a job getting optician's appointments.

JaneJudge according to Mr Scones people are queueing for petrol as the price is meant to be going up and according to him (put on Victor Meldrew voice now) 'Dingbats are queueing for 90 minutes with their engines idling to save £1.50 on a tank of fuel'.

Urmstongran

Bingo Josianne!

What game are we playing now?

Bingo Josianne!

2 of our local vets, in France, have recently moved from the UK after many years working there. One is Italian, the other Spanish.

That's good then Bossyrossy.
My initial reaction, as an animal lover, was solely for your dog, but I realised after I might have been missing the point of the thread.
Hope you get the vaccinations sorted.

Josianne, I simply posed a question, where have all the vets gone? How people answer it is up to them. All responses gratefully received.

As the OP has yet to return to tell us how this thread was supposed to run and we are all chatting in a friendly manner

I went to the vet last week because the puppy had something looking like kennel cough. He had indeed picked up a virus which is apparently rampant at the moment, goodness knows how because he is still on a lead. Anyway the vet joked that if only we could put masks on our pets' noses, the vets wouldn't have to treat half the contagious illnesses animals pick up!

I know from a family vet that one issue is that so many people got new animals during lockdown, so they are just well an truly booked and unable to take new clients. They are also struggling to get through regular pet care.

Most are doing their very best and working many extra hours

Our vet of many years recently retired, however, 2 young female vets have joined the practice and appointments going smoothly.
I recently had our cat in to have an ID chip inserted plus a general check over. Only difference is I cannot go into the surgery and handed her over to the vet at the door, same again when I collected her.

It is, I agree JaneJudge, on the whole, everything is such a bloody mess!

I’ve got a 6 year old dog and no problems seeing a vet when needed. We’ve also just got 2 kittens and they’ve been well looked after with vaccines etc . Maybe it’s a regional thing. I’m no Bristol.

Brexit has been an issue as many young vets from the EU like to work in the UK for experience, it's a huge problem in abattoirs as many of the vets were from Poland, apparently it's not a popular job with UK vets! Added to that is the number of vet practices that have been bought by big corporations, the partners get enough money to retire and the working conditions for the remaining vets can be pretty poor (according to my farrier who is my source of vet gossip) so they are leaving to work abroad.

We are okay at the moment. Our dog, a border collie is very high maintenance. He goes once a month for an arthritis injection, no problem with this. Only one of us is allowed to go in with him.
His annual vaccinations were due August but they did call me and explain he wouldn't have have them until Pctober. He is having them on Wednesday.
We also go to the weight clinic regularly as well, again no problem.
They also email me 24 hours before each appointment to remind me.
I'm not sure how many vets are in the practice as they do have 6 different locations. Village and small town locations.
We had a bad experience with vetsforpets and wouldn't use them. But that is just me personally.

PamelaJ1

Well the two in our family are, at this moment in time,
isolating in a hotel in HK where they are due to start work next week.
£120,000/yr tax free and reasonable hours.
They have both worked in the U.K. for a couple of years and are fed up of the way they were treated. Hopefully this will be changing and when they return in a couple of years they will be valued by their their future employers.
WWM, in their case nothing to do with Brexit.

No doesn’t sound like it???

I was quoting what my vet said when I asked him why the wait for an appointment.

“Brexit” he replied, which I found entirely believable as they had employed a lot of European youngsters. They were good too enthusiastic and always pleasant.

In the past I’ve given lodgings to a number of vets, none of them UK born. The vets I’ve hosted have all been in high demand in countries like Dubai and the UEA where salaries are astronomically high, but all were committed to working and living in the UK……..until Brexit. So one Italian and two Spanish vets I know have now all left the UK and are working in the Middle East.

Well the two in our family are, at this moment in time,
isolating in a hotel in HK where they are due to start work next week.
£120,000/yr tax free and reasonable hours.
They have both worked in the U.K. for a couple of years and are fed up of the way they were treated. Hopefully this will be changing and when they return in a couple of years they will be valued by their their future employers.
WWM, in their case nothing to do with Brexit.