Australia will be short 6981 FTE specialists by 2033 yet simultaneously have an oversupply of 7867 FTE junior doctors, suggests modelling by the Department of Health, Disability and Ageing.

If current trends continue, by 2048 the discrepancy will blow out to about 13,000 too few specialists — including GPs — but 11,000 too many junior doctors, according to the Whole of Medical Workforce Supply and Demand Compendium Report.

Published this month, the report projects the medical workforce will remain broadly balanced over the next seven and 22 years in terms of doctors per patient — just maldistributed, with a tighter training bottleneck.

“The projections suggest that the number of hospital prevocational doctors is expected to more than double over the next 25 years, reaching an oversupply of about 28% by 2048.