Resident Physicians in England to Launch Five Consecutive Day Strike in November
Doctors in the UK are preparing to begin a five-day strike next month, due to disputes regarding jobs and pay.
Strike Details
The BMA stated that resident doctors will strike for five days in a row from November 14 at 7am to November 19 at 7am.
Resident doctors, who constitute about half of all medical staff in the National Health Service, are taking this action after failed negotiations with the health department.
Reasons Behind the Strike
Dr Jack Fletcher commented, “This is not where we wanted to be. We have spent the last week in talks with government, urging the health secretary to end the crisis of doctors going unemployed.”
“We know from our own survey half of second-year doctors in the UK are struggling to find jobs, their talents being unused whilst millions of patients wait endlessly for treatment and shifts in hospitals remain vacant. This cannot continue.”
He added, “We negotiated sincerely, hoping the health secretary to see that a deal offering solutions to slowly restore the cuts to pay over several years, providing recent graduates a pay increase of just a pound an hour for the coming four years.”
“We trusted the government would recognize that our asks are not just reasonable but are in the interest of the public and our patients and would also help stop our physicians leaving the health service.”
Who Are Resident Physicians?
Resident doctors have as much as eight years of experience practicing in hospitals, depending on their specialty, or up to three years in primary care.
Further information will follow soon.
