Junior Doctors in England to Launch Five Consecutive Day Walkout Next Month
Doctors in the UK are set to begin a five consecutive day walkout in November, in protest over pay and employment.
Strike Details
The British Medical Association (BMA) announced that junior physicians will strike for five consecutive days from November 14 at 7am to November 19 at 7am.
Junior physicians, who constitute about half of all doctors in the NHS, are taking this action after unsuccessful talks with the health department.
Reasons Behind the Strike
The chair of the BMA’s resident doctors committee stated, “We did not want to reach this point. We have been negotiating for the past week with officials, pressing the health minister to resolve the crisis of unemployed physicians.”
“We know from our own survey half of second-year doctors in the UK are struggling to find jobs, their talents being unused whilst countless individuals wait endlessly for treatment and hospital shifts remain vacant. This is a situation which cannot go on.”
He continued, “We talked with the government in good faith, keen for the health secretary to see that a deal including options to slowly restore the cuts to pay over a number of years, giving newly trained doctors a pay increase of just a pound an hour for the coming four years.”
“We trusted the authorities would see that our demands are not just reasonable but are in the best interests of the community and our patients and would also help stop our physicians departing from the health service.”
About Resident Doctors
Junior physicians have as much as eight years of experience practicing in hospitals, based on their field, or up to three years in general practice.
More details are expected shortly.
