Countries with the Most Nurses Per Capita (2025 Ranked)
Photo: Cedric Fauntleroy / Pexels
Nurses are the primary point of contact in healthcare systems worldwide. They outnumber doctors by roughly four to one globally, provide the majority of direct patient care, and are the single largest component of every healthcare workforce. The ratio of nurses to population is one of the clearest indicators of a healthcare system's capacity — its ability not merely to treat patients but to sustain safe staffing levels, maintain adequate observation ratios, and respond to demand spikes. Norway leads this ranking with 18+ nurses per 1,000 people. Ethiopia sits at 0.3. That 60-fold difference is not just a healthcare statistic — it describes the distance between a functional healthcare system and one in permanent structural crisis.
Source: OECD Health at a Glance 2023; WHO Global Health Workforce Statistics Database
What the Data Measures and Why It Matters
The WHO tracks nursing and midwifery personnel per 1,000 population using data reported by national health ministries. The OECD Health at a Glance series provides the most comprehensive comparable data for member states. Both sources cover people currently employed in nursing roles, not the number trained.
The WHO minimum threshold for basic health services — 4.45 doctors, nurses, and midwives per 1,000 people combined — is a floor, not a target. Countries that fall below this threshold typically cannot provide universal primary care coverage, manage routine infectious disease, or staff hospitals safely. As of the most recent WHO assessment, approximately 55 countries fall below this threshold — almost all in Sub-Saharan Africa and South Asia.
The OECD average as of 2023 was just over 9 nurses per 1,000 people. Countries above this average tend to have universal healthcare systems, strong nursing unions, competitive graduate salaries, and sustained investment in nursing education capacity.
A nurse-to-patient ratio of 1:5 or better on hospital wards is associated with measurable improvements in patient survival. Landmark research from California — which mandated maximum 1:5 nurse-to-patient ratios in 2004 — found that each additional patient per nurse was associated with a 7% increase in patient mortality. This evidence base is now robust enough that minimum nurse ratios are a mainstream patient safety recommendation in high-income countries.
Countries with the Most Nurses Per Capita
Nursing and midwifery personnel per 1,000 population, WHO/OECD 2022–2023
| Rank | Country | Nurses per 1,000 | Total nurses (approx.) | Notes |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | Norway | 18.0 | 97,000 | Highest globally; Nordic welfare state model |
| 2 | Finland | 18.0 | 100,000 | Equal with Norway in latest OECD data |
| 3 | Switzerland | 17.4 | 153,000 | High wages; significant international recruitment |
| 4 | Iceland | 15.9 | 5,600 | Small population inflates per-capita ratio |
| 5 | Denmark | 14.3 | 85,000 | |
| 6 | New Zealand | 13.8 | 70,000 | |
| 7 | Germany | 12.5–13.0 | 1,040,000 | Large absolute workforce |
| 8 | Japan | 12.1 | 1,530,000 | Ageing population driving demand |
| 9 | Australia | 12.8 | 330,000 | Strong system; significant rural shortages |
| 10 | United States | 11.7 | 3,900,000 | Largest absolute nursing workforce; uneven distribution |
| 11 | Ireland | 12.5 | 63,000 | |
| 12 | Netherlands | 11.1 | 195,000 | |
| 13 | Sweden | 11.4 | 118,000 | |
| 14 | France | 10.2 | 680,000 | |
| 15 | Canada | 10.4 | 420,000 | |
| 16 | United Kingdom | 8.8 | 600,000 | Significant shortage; 40,000+ NHS vacancies |
| 20 | South Korea | 7.9 | 410,000 | Rapidly expanding training capacity |
| 30 | Brazil | 7.5 | 1,600,000 | Large absolute; major rural inequality |
| 40 | China | 3.2 | 4,600,000 | Largest absolute workforce; low per capita |
| 50 | India | 1.7 | 2,400,000 | Severe shortage relative to population |
| 60 | Nigeria | 1.6 | 350,000 | |
| 70 | Ethiopia | 0.3 | 37,000 | Critical shortage; well below WHO minimum |
Source: OECD Health at a Glance 2023; WHO Global Health Workforce Statistics; Our World in Data, Nurses per 1,000
Where This Data Comes From
Nurse-to-population ratios are sourced from the WHO Global Health Workforce Statistics database and the OECD Health at a Glance series. Both compile data reported by national health ministries and measure nursing and midwifery personnel currently employed. The figures reflect registered nurses, professional nurses, and midwives — definitional boundaries vary by country, so some variation in how comparable figures truly are across countries reflects national licensing and credential systems.
OECD data is most reliable for its 38 member countries with standardised reporting; WHO data covers more countries but with variable quality. Countries with weak health information systems (many Sub-Saharan nations, some Middle Eastern states) provide estimates that may undercount informal, community-based, or inadequately registered nursing staff — actual numbers could be higher than reported. Conversely, some countries may over-report, including quasi-nursing roles in their counts. The data reflects a snapshot in 2022-2023; rapid growth in nursing education (particularly in Asia and sub-Saharan Africa) means current figures may differ meaningfully from published data for countries with recent rapid training expansion.
Why Norway and Finland Lead
Norway and Finland's position at the top of this ranking reflects the Nordic welfare state model applied systematically to health workforce planning — investment that produces outcomes visible in every health metric these countries report.
The Funding Model
Norway's universal healthcare system (funded through oil revenues and progressive taxation) and Finland's similar tax-funded model both invest heavily in nursing education capacity, workplace conditions, and salaries. The result is a profession that attracts and retains domestic talent at a rate that most other countries cannot match.
Norwegian nurses represented by the Norwegian Nurses Organisation (Norsk Sykepleierforbund) have consistently negotiated working conditions — capped shift lengths, mandatory rest periods, competitive pension benefits, meaningful career progression — that make nursing an attractive long-term career rather than a temporary job while waiting for something else. This retention effectiveness is the key variable: it is easier and cheaper to retain an experienced nurse than to train a new one.
The Pipeline
Both countries operate widely distributed nursing education programmes — not concentrated in capital cities. Students in rural northern Norway or Finnish Lapland can access bachelor's-level nursing programmes locally, reducing the migration to cities that concentrates nurses in urban areas while depleting rural healthcare. This geographic distribution of training capacity matters for producing a nursing workforce that covers the whole country.
The Challenge Even at the Top
Even Norway and Finland face structural nursing workforce challenges. Ageing populations are increasing healthcare demand faster than nursing supply grows. Rural communities in both countries face staffing difficulties. And the OECD's 2023 analysis found that one quarter of nurses across OECD countries are over 55 — creating a retirement wave that will increase pressure on already strained training pipelines.
Source: OECD Society at a Glance 2024, Health and care workforce
The Philippines: The World's Nurse Factory
The Philippines occupies a position in global nursing unlike any other country. It has deliberately constructed a national system to train nurses for export — and that system now supplies a significant fraction of the world's internationally mobile nursing workforce.
The Scale of the Operation
As of 2023, the Philippines had 1,282 nursing schools — up from 17 in 1940. The country trains tens of thousands of registered nurses annually, a significant proportion of whom emigrate within a few years of qualifying. Filipino nurses constituted approximately 33% of all foreign-born registered nurses in the United States as of 2022 — a staggering market concentration.
Filipino nurses work in virtually every country with healthcare workforce shortages: the US, UK, Saudi Arabia, UAE, Singapore, Japan, Canada, Germany, and most of the EU. The Philippines accounts for an estimated 25% of all internationally mobile nurses globally.
Source: Harvard International Review, "From US Reign to Brain Drain: The Mass Emigration of Filipino Nurses"
Historical Roots
The export model has colonial roots. US colonial administration of the Philippines (1898–1946) established English-language nursing education modelled explicitly on American standards — a system designed for an American-credentialled workforce from the beginning. After Philippine independence, overseas employment became a structural feature of the economy: remittances from overseas workers (OFWs) are a foundational component of Philippine GDP.
By 2022, total Philippine remittances reached an all-time high of $35.14 billion — approximately 8.9% of GDP. Nursing remittances contribute an estimated $8 billion of this total.
Curriculum Designed for Export
Philippine nursing schools align their curriculum directly with destination country licensing requirements. The NCLEX (US nursing licensing exam) and the UK NMC registration standards are built into Philippine nursing education. This is training explicitly designed for export — a fact the Philippine government has acknowledged and institutionalised through the Philippine Overseas Employment Administration (POEA), which facilitates nurse deployment agreements with receiving countries.
The Cost to the Philippines Itself
The macro-economic success of nurse export has a direct domestic healthcare cost. The Philippines currently faces a shortage of approximately 127,000 nurses — a figure expected to grow to 250,000 by 2030 as emigration continues to exceed domestic training output reaching domestic employment. Filipino nurses abroad earn 10× or more what they earn in domestic hospitals, creating an essentially irresistible economic incentive to leave.
Public hospitals in Metro Manila routinely operate at 2–4 times patient capacity with inadequate nurse-to-patient ratios. The remittance economy that benefits Filipino families and the national current account is funded partly by domestic patients who lack adequate care.
Source: ITV News, "The Philippines' critical brain drain as nurses leave for jobs abroad," 2023
The United Kingdom: A Chronic Shortage Made Structural
The UK's 8.8 nurses per 1,000 people places it well below the OECD average — a shortfall that has characterised the NHS for decades and been repeatedly exacerbated by policy decisions.
The Vacancy Crisis
The NHS in England has carried 40,000–50,000+ unfilled nursing vacancies consistently for years. These vacancies translate directly into patient risk: wards running below safe staffing levels, extended shifts for existing staff, and reduced capacity to take on elective work. The NHS Constitution commits to "safe staffing" but sets no legally binding nurse-to-patient ratios — unlike California or the Republic of Ireland, both of which have enacted mandatory minimums.
The Bursary Decision
In 2017, the Conservative government removed nursing student bursaries — replacing grants that covered tuition and living costs with standard student loans. The stated rationale was fiscal: bursaries were a significant government expenditure. The immediate consequence was a 23% fall in nursing school applications in 2017, followed by a multi-year reduction in UK-trained nurse pipeline output whose effects compound annually. The bursary was partially reinstated in 2020 — too late to prevent several cohort shortfalls from entering the workforce.
Brexit's Nursing Consequence
Before Brexit, approximately 20,000 EU-trained nurses worked in the NHS, taking advantage of the EU's mutual recognition of professional qualifications and the free movement of labour. After Brexit ended free movement, EU nurse migration to the UK slowed sharply, and many EU nurses who were already working in the NHS returned home or chose other destinations within the Schengen area.
The NHS has partially compensated through international recruitment — primarily from the Philippines, India, Nigeria, and Zimbabwe. Between 2021 and 2023, the NHS recruited approximately 50,000 internationally trained nurses. This addresses UK shortfalls but raises ethical questions: recruiting nurses from Nigeria (1.6 per 1,000) or Zimbabwe (1.2 per 1,000) enriches UK healthcare capacity while further depleting countries that are already well below the WHO minimum threshold.
Sub-Saharan Africa: The Existential Deficit
If Norway's 18 nurses per 1,000 represents one end of the global nursing distribution, Sub-Saharan Africa represents the other. The scale of the deficit is not comparable to shortages in the UK or US — it is a different category of problem.
The Numbers
Ethiopia's 0.3 nurses per 1,000 people is one-sixtieth of Norway's ratio. Malawi, South Sudan, Chad, and Niger all sit below 0.5. The WHO minimum of 4.45 total health workers per 1,000 people is, for many Sub-Saharan countries, not a near-term achievable target but a distant aspiration.
The practical consequences are visible in every health outcome metric. Sub-Saharan Africa has the world's highest maternal mortality rates, the highest rates of preventable infectious disease death, and the highest child mortality — all partly attributable to inadequate healthcare staffing. A nurse in Malawi managing a hospital ward that should have five or six staff members is not merely overworked; she is providing care that falls systematically below what the evidence requires for safe outcomes.
The Double Burden of Brain Drain
The fiscal absurdity at the heart of global nursing migration is this: when the UK, US, or Germany recruits a nurse from Ghana, Nigeria, or Ethiopia, the receiving country acquires a skilled professional whose training cost — typically $30,000–$50,000 equivalent in educational investment — was borne entirely by the country that can least afford it.
The WHO and international health economists have coined the term "perverse subsidy" for this flow: poor countries train health workers, rich countries recruit them, and the net transfer of human capital from south to north is economically equivalent to a development subsidy flowing in the wrong direction. Some estimates suggest Sub-Saharan Africa's total investment in health worker education that has departed for OECD countries exceeds $2 billion annually.
What Investment Would Actually Fix This
Addressing Sub-Saharan Africa's nursing deficit requires sustained investment in nursing school capacity, faculty, clinical training infrastructure, and — critically — domestic salaries high enough to retain graduates. This requires both national government investment and international support, since many of the countries with the most severe deficits also have the most constrained health budgets.
The WHO's recommendation is that high-income countries that recruit from low-income countries should provide compensatory investment in those countries' health workforce training capacity. The 2010 WHO Global Code of Practice on the International Recruitment of Health Personnel provides ethical guidelines for this — but the Code is voluntary and compliance is inconsistent.
Source: WHO, Global Code of Practice on the International Recruitment of Health Personnel (2010)
The Global Nursing Workforce in 2035: A Crisis in Motion
The WHO's projection of a 13 million health worker shortfall by 2035 is not a distant forecast — it reflects trends already established and compounding: Another health-system ranking is countries with the most organ donors per capita.
Ageing nursing workforces. One quarter of OECD nurses are over 55. In the US, the median age of the registered nurse workforce is 52. The retirement wave from this cohort will remove more nurses annually than training pipelines currently produce in many countries.
COVID burnout and early exit. An estimated 20% of US nurses reported intent to leave the profession within two years in a 2022 AMN Healthcare survey. NHS England reported a 25% increase in nursing staff leaving its workforce in 2021–2022 compared to 2019 figures. Burnout during the COVID-19 pandemic accelerated early retirement and career changes among nurses who might otherwise have worked another decade.
Demand outpacing supply. Ageing populations in OECD countries require more healthcare. Chronic disease prevalence increases with age. Long-term care — nursing-intensive — grows as populations age. Demand for nurses is increasing structurally while supply faces headwinds.
Inadequate pipeline expansion. Nursing education requires clinical placements in hospitals and health centres — placements that are already constrained by existing nursing shortages. There is a structural limit to how fast new nurses can be trained when clinical training capacity is limited by the same workforce shortage the training is designed to address.
Source: WHO, Health Workforce 2030 — Global Strategy on Human Resources for Health
Nurse Salaries Globally: The Engine of Migration
Understanding why nurses migrate requires understanding salary differentials — which are among the most dramatic for any skilled profession globally.
| Country | Annual nurse salary (approximate) | Notes |
|---|---|---|
| Switzerland | CHF 85,000–100,000 (~$95–110K USD) | Highest in Europe |
| United States | $75,000–95,000 (travel nurses: $100–150K+) | Large regional variation |
| Australia | AUD $70,000–95,000 (~$47–63K USD) | Plus generous superannuation |
| Germany | €38,000–52,000 (~$41–56K USD) | Shortage pushing wages up |
| United Kingdom | £28,000–45,000 (~$35–57K USD) | Widely seen as inadequate |
| Japan | ¥4.0–5.5 million (~$26–36K USD) | |
| Philippines (domestic) | PHP 25,000–35,000/month (~$450–630 USD/month) | $5,400–7,600/year |
| India | INR 15,000–25,000/month (~$180–300 USD/month) | $2,160–3,600/year |
| Ethiopia | ~$100–150/month | ~$1,200–1,800/year |
Source: OECD Health at a Glance 2023; Harvard International Review
A Filipino nurse can earn 10–15 times their domestic salary by moving to the US or UK. An Ethiopian nurse can earn 50–80 times their domestic salary by doing the same. These are not marginal incentives — they are so large that no individually rational nurse from these countries has a strong reason not to emigrate if the opportunity is available. The structural incentive for brain drain is built into the global salary architecture.
Frequently Asked Questions
Q: How do nurse-to-patient ratios affect outcomes? A: The evidence is among the strongest in healthcare safety research. California's 2004 mandatory nurse-to-patient ratio law (maximum 5:1 on medical-surgical wards, 2:1 in intensive care) has been studied extensively. Each additional patient per nurse above the mandated ratio was associated with a 7% increase in 30-day patient mortality. UK NHS research (Rafferty et al., The Lancet, 2007) found that each additional patient per nurse was associated with a 26% increase in mortality odds. Similar findings have been replicated in Australia, Belgium, and other countries. Minimum nurse staffing ratios are now a mainstream patient safety intervention with a level of evidence comparable to surgical checklists.
Q: Is the global nursing shortage getting worse? A: Yes, and the trajectory is clear. Ageing workforces are retiring faster than replacements are trained in most OECD countries. COVID-19 accelerated early exits from the profession. Demand is growing as populations age. The WHO's 13 million shortfall projection for 2035 is based on conservative assumptions — actual shortfall could be larger depending on retention outcomes. The shortage is structural, not cyclical.
Q: What is the difference between a registered nurse (RN) and a licensed practical nurse (LPN/LVN)? A: Registered nurses hold a bachelor's or associate's degree and full nursing licensure — authorised to assess patients, develop care plans, administer complex medications, and supervise other staff. Licensed practical nurses (or vocational nurses in some jurisdictions) complete a shorter training programme (typically 12 months) and operate under RN supervision with a more limited scope of practice. Most nurse-to-population ratios in WHO and OECD data count both, though some countries report them separately. Advanced Practice Registered Nurses (APRNs) — nurse practitioners, clinical nurse specialists, nurse anaesthetists — hold master's or doctoral degrees and practice with physician-level scope in many jurisdictions.
Q: Why does Japan have relatively high nurses per capita but still face shortages? A: Japan's 12.1 nurses per 1,000 appears adequate by OECD standards, but several factors create functional shortages. Japan's population is ageing faster than almost any other country — the share of population aged 65+ is approximately 30%, the highest in the world — generating enormous and growing demand for nursing-intensive long-term care. Japan also has the world's highest rate of psychiatric beds per capita, with proportionally fewer community-based care models. The absolute demand for nursing care in an ageing Japan outpaces supply even at existing ratios. Additionally, Japan faces retention challenges: nursing in Japan involves demanding conditions relative to Northern Europe, and exit rates among nurses in their 30s (often leaving to have children) are high compared to OECD peers.
Q: What is the WHO Global Code of Practice on international nurse recruitment? A: The 2010 WHO Global Code of Practice on the International Recruitment of Health Personnel is a voluntary international framework encouraging countries that recruit health workers from developing countries to: provide data transparency, offer bilateral agreements that include capacity-building support to source countries, and avoid actively recruiting from countries facing critical health workforce shortages (as defined by the WHO). Major violations are rarely sanctioned since the Code is voluntary, but it provides an ethical framework and political reference point. Several countries including the UK and Canada have incorporated Code principles into their domestic international recruitment policies.
Q: How can low-income countries increase their nursing workforce? A: The evidence points to several compounding interventions. Expanding nursing school capacity — particularly in rural areas — increases geographic access to training. Increasing public sector nursing salaries reduces the domestic-international wage gap enough to retain some graduates. Offering non-financial incentives (housing, training opportunities, career advancement structures) addresses quality-of-life drivers of emigration. Task-shifting — training community health workers to perform some nursing functions under supervision — extends limited nursing capacity. None of these solutions alone is sufficient; they work best in combination with sustained political commitment and international financial support.
The Takeaway
Nurse-to-population ratios divide the world as clearly as income: Norway and Finland's 18 nurses per 1,000 versus Ethiopia's 0.3 is not a minor quantitative difference but a qualitative divide between a healthcare system that can sustain safe staffing and one that cannot. The Philippines has built a development model on nurse export that supports its economy through remittances while hollowing out its own healthcare. The UK and US have resolved domestic nursing shortages by recruiting from the countries — Nigeria, Ethiopia, the Philippines, Zimbabwe — that can least afford to lose trained workers. The 13 million health worker shortfall projected for 2035 cannot be addressed by recruiting more nurses from poor countries. It requires investing in training capacity where the deficit actually exists, creating working conditions in wealthy countries that retain domestically trained workers, and paying nurses — everywhere — salaries commensurate with the skill, responsibility, and irreplaceability of what they do.
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SciHub101 is an independent science and technology publication founded and edited by Buğra Sözeri, a software engineer and app developer based in Türkiye. AI tools assist with drafting and research. Source documentation in the existing archive is uneven, and articles are being reviewed and corrected. The Editorial Team byline identifies editorial responsibility; it does not certify specialist or independent human review. Where we compare products, anything built by our own team is labelled as such — see the editorial guidelines and About page for how corrections and disclosures work.
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