Less Dentists in the U.S.A. ?

Recently many news reports discuss the future of American dentistry and come to a very sad conclusion: very soon the United States shall witness a shortage of dentists.

"Residents of the United States who need teeth extracted may soon have to do it the old-fashioned way — with pliers, whisky and elbow grease — because there may not be enough dentists to go around." These are the remarkes from today's news story:
United States faces dentist shortage by Roger Collier, CMAJ

"The number of practicing dentists is projected to start declining in 2014, which will likely exacerbate an existing problem: the unwillingness of many to practice in rural areas. Further compounding the problem are such factors as a continuing migration from general practice to specialties like orthodontics, the closure of dental schools, a decrease in the size of graduating classes, the forthcoming mass retirement of older dentists and the growing number of female dentists, who tend to work fewer hours than their male colleagues."

Dental technicians seem to be falling in this sad trend. However, we may provide some statistics on how are the things going on in the U.S.A. as compared to the rest of world.  ASMDT compiled this Selected Statistics on World Dental Laboratory Technicians - based on the data of the World Health Organization (WHO). Germany (with the number of dentists twice as low as compared to America) is the leader with the number of Dental Lab Technicians, and the U.S.A. is not far behind.  

We are not overall pessimistic - we still hope that somewhere around the people with "with pliers, whisky and elbow grease" Dental Lab Technicians might be standing with a helping hand???