Junior Physicians in England to Stage Five Consecutive Day Strike Next Month
Medical professionals in England are preparing to begin a five consecutive day walkout next month, due to disputes regarding pay and employment.
Walkout Information
The BMA announced that junior physicians will strike for five consecutive days from November 14 at 7am to 7am on 19 November.
Junior physicians, who constitute about half of all doctors in the National Health Service, are proceeding with the strike after failed negotiations with the government.
Reasons Behind the Strike
The chair of the BMA’s resident doctors committee stated, “This is not where we wanted to be. We have been negotiating for the past week with officials, urging the health minister to resolve the scandal of doctors going unemployed.”
“Our survey reveals 50% of second-year physicians in England are struggling to find jobs, their skills going to waste whilst millions of patients wait endlessly for treatment and shifts in hospitals go unfilled. This is a situation which cannot go on.”
He added, “We negotiated sincerely, hoping the health secretary to see that a deal including options to slowly restore the pay reductions over several years, providing newly trained doctors a pay increase of only £1 per hour for the coming four years.”
“We trusted the authorities would see that our demands are not just fair but are in the interest of the community and our patients and would also help stop our physicians leaving the NHS.”
Who Are Resident Physicians?
Junior physicians have anywhere up to eight years’ experience working as a hospital doctor, based on their field, or as many as three years in primary care.
More details are expected shortly.
