--- title: "US Hospitals Are Outsourcing In-Person Nursing to Remote Health Workers in the Philippines" description: "International telehealth corporations are hiring thousands of Filipino healthcare workers to oversee care for patients in the US." date: "2026-07-18" modified: "2026-07-18" authors: - name: "Joe Wilkins" job_title: "Correspondent" link: "https://futurism.com/authors/jwilkins" url: "https://futurism.com/health-medicine/hospitals-outsourcing-nurses-remote-health-workers-philippines" categories: - "Developments" - "Health & Medicine" --- # US Hospitals Are Outsourcing In-Person Nursing to Remote Health Workers in the Philippines ![A colorful graphic illustration featuring a photograph of a nurse.]() *Illustration by Tag Hartman-Simkins / Futurism. Source: Shutterstock* The next time you're checking into a hospital, it's possible that your nurse may actually be 8,000 miles away. That's the reality at a growing number of hospitals throughout the US and the world, which are turning to low-paid telehealth workers in the Philippines to help fill in the duty roster. As it is for [remote driving]() and [AI data labeling](), the Philippines has become a wellspring of cheap labor for transnational healthcare companies, which are more than happy to exploit a country where [millions of people]() live in poverty. Stunning [reporting by *Rest of World*]() detailed the lives of some of the 210,000 full-time Filipino workers employed in remote healthcare. This new class of workers makes up for a massive shortage of almost 80,000 registered nurses in the US. One of the workers, Alice, is a licensed nurse working in Quezon City, a city of three million people in the Philippines. In 2019, she signed on with a telehealth company providing mental health and substance abuse treatment to US-based patients in California and New Mexico. Alice told *RoW* she earns $5 an hour, five times as much as the hospital job she left behind. "We have this virtual clinic that functions like a lobby where patients check in," Alice explained, "and then we traffic or triage them and send them to each of the providers' personal Zoom room." To get a job communing with US patients through a screen, a Filipino worker simply needs to have a medical degree — it doesn't matter what kind. While it's likely that many telehealth recruits come from healthcare administration backgrounds, *RoW* notes that about 30 percent of the people employed in these jobs are trained nurses or other medical professionals. The result is a scenario where tens of thousands of healthcare workers are physically present in their communities, but spend their days caring for patients half a world away in a desperate bid to pay the bills. Already facing a [mounting shortage]() of trained healthcare professionals, the Filipino people have watched as telehealth corporations court the remaining hospital workers to oversee care for patients in the US. "If they can't go abroad, remote nursing is the next best thing because local wages are so low," Nico Uba, secretary general of the group Filipino Nurses United told *RoW*. "Then local hospitals are left understaffed and overworked." The companies running this insidious scheme prey on two sets of healthcare workers on opposite ends of the world: the underpaid Filipino, for whom a wage of $5 an hour is much higher than the [national average](), and the overworked American, for whom a [50-hour work week]() is practically a vacation. The remote healthcare industry is well aware of this tension, and is happy to take advantage. As JL Botor, president of the Healthcare Information Management Association of the Philippines told *RoW*, US hospitals can save up to 70 percent of their overhead costs by hiring Filipino workers instead. In all, Botor notes that the country is a "clinical process outsourcing powerhouse," as well as "a premier global hub for supporting overstressed international healthcare systems." **More on healthcare:** *[Lawsuit Claims the Mayo Clinic's Use of AI Is Butchering Patient Care]()* ## Author At Futurism, I focus on the intersection of technology and power — examining the economics, history, and politics behind today’s dystopian headlines. As a writer, I’m interested in topics ranging from AI’s impact on labor to startups nobody asked for. My prior work includes bylines in Jacobin, Verso, and Blue Labyrinths. My work for Futurism has been cited by publications including Forbes, The Guardian, MIT Technology Review, Time, The Nation, Mother Jones, The Verge, and Wired. I grew up in Michigan, attending Central Michigan University as well as Ball State University, where I earned a master of music. I now live in Brooklyn with my girlfriend and our cat Ziti. On weekends, you can find me hunched over a cold pint arguing geopolitics with the other transplants. ### Author social links [Bluesky]()