Marcos wants government anti-human trafficking... Seeking employment...

initiatives, public-private partnerships to thwart the business of human trafficking in its multifarious operations on the ground and now becoming more and more important online,” Marcos said.

According to Marcos, human trafficking is an ongoing problem for many countries as the global economy recovers from the COVID-19 pandemic. People without work and source of livelihood make them more vulnerable to human traffickers and it’s time for government to intervene, he added.

“I think the room for improvement here is that we can work together more and coordinate together more and where – that puts meat on the bones of what we have come to call the wholeof-government approach and bring everything to bear to the problems that we are facing,” the president said.

Marcos instructed agencies to halt the operation of human traffickers who exploit the physical and economic weaknesses of vulnerable people, especially women and children.

He also cited the need for the country to keep its status in the tier system.

“I remember (Migrant Workers) Secretary (Susan) Toots (Ople) and I started on this campaign to remove us from Tier 2. We were in danger coming down to Tier 3 at the time. So we managed to take us back up to Tier 1. And let’s just make sure that the Tier 1 categorization or status of the Philippines is not put in any danger,” the President noted, referring to the annual assessment of the U.S. State Department’s

Trafficking in Persons Office.

The Chief Executive also tasked the Presidential Communications Office to help the IACAT by launching a communication campaign to educate the public about the danger posed by human trafficking syndicates.

Meanwhile, the Department of Justice has ordered the IACAT to alert all its agencies to take action against the “alarming” number of Filipino human trafficking victims, which has reached nearly 2,000 just in the first two months of year.

Justice Secretary Jesus Crispin Remulla said the IACAT would be mobilizing all its member agencies to address the “very alarming” human trafficking situation in the country. He said Filipino victims were mostly trafficked or attempted to be transported to Southeast Asian countries.

“This is what we call modern-day slavery. That’s why Filipinos should be careful. We should have a checklist before we want to go abroad,” he told reporters. – Neil Jayson Servallos n

Quoting prominent FilAmerican immigration lawyer Salvador Tuy, Geslani said that Filipino nurses and caregivers can depart faster for the U.S. “as long as the required documents are submitted electronically to the hospital or caregiving facility who had requested for the immigrant visa for her.”

According to Tuy, the pathway for Filipino nurses to enter the healthcare industry in the U.S. has become easier and faster through the electronic processing system implemented by the United States Citizenship and Immigration Service (USCIS).

He said a foreign nurse who is issued an immigrant visa by the USCIS automatically becomes a green card holder and has permanent resident status in the U.S.

Tuy said that there is a current shortage of 190,000 nurses in the U.S. Nurses there receive an average monthly salary of $6,900 or higher depending on the specialty and professional experience.

Based on records, about 18,617 Filipino nurses took the latest National Council Licensure Examination – a 90 percent jump compared to the previous year.

“This indicates the strong interest of the nurses to work for better employment opportunities and for their future in America,” Geslani pointed out.

It is expected that more than one-half of those who took the exams will pursue their desire to work in the U.S. with the passing rate of 80 percent set up by the National Council of State Boards of Nursing.

The demand for Filipino nurses for employment to U.S. Hospitals continues to rise with the easing of COVID restrictions and huge shortage of health workers to care for the rising population of senior citizens known as “baby boomers.”

Meanwhile other Filipino nurses who could not wait for U.S. jobs opted to work in the UK or Germany to join the National Health Service, or the Triple-Win system of the Department of Migrant Workers/Philippine Overseas Employment Agency. (with reports from Rudy Santos) n