Resident Physicians in England to Launch Five-Day Strike Next Month
Doctors in England are preparing to begin a five-day walkout in November, due to disputes regarding pay and employment.
Strike Details
The British Medical Association (BMA) announced that junior physicians will strike for five days in a row from November 14 at 7am to 7am on 19 November.
Junior physicians, who make up about half of all doctors in the National Health Service, are taking this action after failed negotiations 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 end the crisis of unemployed physicians.”
“We know from our own survey 50% of second-year physicians in England are facing unemployment, their skills going to waste whilst countless individuals wait endlessly for treatment and shifts in hospitals go unfilled. This cannot continue.”
He added, “We negotiated sincerely, keen for the health secretary to see that a deal offering solutions to gradually reverse the pay reductions over a number of years, giving recent graduates a pay increase of just a pound an hour for the next four years.”
“We trusted the government would recognize that our demands are not just reasonable but are in the interest of the community and our those we treat and would also help stop our physicians leaving the health service.”
Who Are Resident Physicians?
Resident doctors have anywhere up to eight years’ experience practicing in hospitals, depending on their specialty, or up to three years in primary care.
Further information are expected soon.
