Junior Physicians in England to Launch Five-Day Walkout Next Month
Doctors in the UK are set to begin a five-day strike next month, in protest over jobs and pay.
Strike Details
The British Medical Association (BMA) stated that junior physicians will walk out for five consecutive days from 7am on 14 November to November 19 at 7am.
Resident doctors, who constitute nearly 50% of all doctors in the NHS, are taking this action after unsuccessful talks with the government.
Reasons Behind the Strike
The chair of the BMA’s resident doctors committee commented, “We did not want to reach this point. We have spent the last week in talks with officials, pressing the health minister to resolve the scandal of doctors going unemployed.”
“Our survey reveals half of second-year doctors in the UK are struggling to find jobs, their skills going to waste whilst millions of patients wait endlessly for treatment and hospital shifts go unfilled. This is a situation which cannot go on.”
He added, “We talked with the government in good faith, keen for the minister to see that a agreement including options to gradually reverse the cuts to pay over several years, giving newly trained doctors a raise of just a pound an hour for the coming four years.”
“We hoped the government would see that our asks are not just fair but are in the best interests of the community and our those we treat and would also help prevent our doctors departing from the NHS.”
Who Are Resident Physicians?
Resident doctors have anywhere up to eight years’ experience working as a hospital doctor, depending on their specialty, or up to three years in general practice.
Further information will follow shortly.
