Over a third of immigrant healthcare workers leave after five years

Canada’s immigration system is failing to keep medical professionals, with a shocking new study revealing that over a third of immigrant healthcare workers quit and leave the country within five years

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Canada’s immigration system is failing to keep vital medical professionals, with a shocking new study revealing that over a third of immigrant healthcare workers quit and leave the country within five years of arrival.

A new study by the Institute for Canadian Citizenship (ICC), an immigrant advocacy group, reveals that Canada’s retention rate of new immigrants has worsened for the third consecutive year. The third annual “Leaky Bucket 2025: Retention Challenges in Highly Skilled Immigrants and In-Demand Occupations” study shows a worsening trend.

The ICC warns that if current “onward migration” trends persist, 5.3 per cent of the 380,000 permanent residents who arrive in Canada in 2026, or 20,241 immigrants, will leave the country by 2031.

The study’s authors note that immigrants with PhDs are nearly twice as likely to leave as those with a bachelor’s degree, and higher-skilled immigrants are twice as likely to leave as lower-skilled immigrants.

Immigrant healthcare workers and scientists both have a 36 per cent departure rate after five years, the study found.

“Six and a half million people lack a family doctor. Who loses when immigrant healthcare professionals decide to leave?” Daniel Bernhard, the CEO of the ICC, told reporters in Ottawa on Tuesday. “Even those who want lower immigration should support better retention. The immigrant who stays is the immigrant who doesn’t have to be replaced.”

The report also found that executives left at the five-year mark at a rate nearly three times above the average onward migration rate.

The ICC recommends Canada develop a “national retention policy framework” to set targets, track immigrant performance after admission, and guide immigration policy with a focus on retention.

“Canada grows older and weaker and poorer and less interesting. When talented immigrants from around the world decide to leave, it’s time for a national retention framework,” Bernhard said. “IRCC currently has zero staff devoted to retaining the people that their colleagues work so hard to recruit. This obviously has to change.”

The group also called for “supports tailored to highly skilled immigrants,” including bridging programs, licensing pathways, and “personalized settlement plans” to remove commonly cited barriers to staying in the country.

Last month, during a House of Commons health committee meeting, several groups representing internationally trained doctors testified about various licensing barriers, including red tape, training capacity limits, and costs.

One doctor, Therese Bichay, the director of Internationally Trained Physicians in Canada, said many internationally trained physicians are leaving Canada for places that respect their knowledge and experience and allow them to work, including the U.S., U.K., and Australia.

The ICC report also called on the federal government to implement “targeted retention strategies” for occupations in high demand in Canada. They called for “employer incentives,” enhanced credential recognition, and “stronger employment-related settlement services.”

Finally, the immigration advocacy group recommended enhancing employer capacity, mentorship, and career development support to “improve immigrant retention—especially in smaller communities.”

“immigration is not just a favour that we do to immigrants. It’s a service that we do to ourselves. We really need this talent, not just in healthcare, but in engineering and construction,” Bernhard said. “This is an advantage for Canada, and this report hopefully emphasizes the level of talent that is coming here, the degree of benefit that we stand to reap if we can retain this talent enthusiastically to play for our team.”