Resident Physicians in the UK to Launch Five Consecutive Day Walkout in November
Medical professionals in England are set to stage a five-day strike in November, in protest over pay and employment.
Walkout Information
The British Medical Association (BMA) stated that junior physicians will walk out for five days in a row from November 14 at 7am to November 19 at 7am.
Resident doctors, who constitute about half of all doctors in the NHS, are taking this action after failed negotiations with the government.
Causes of the Walkout
Dr Jack Fletcher commented, “We did not want to reach this point. We have been negotiating for the past week with officials, pressing the health secretary to resolve the crisis of doctors going unemployed.”
“Our survey reveals half of second-year doctors 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 cannot continue.”
He continued, “We talked with the government in good faith, keen for the health secretary to see that a deal offering solutions to gradually reverse the cuts to pay over several years, providing recent graduates a raise of only £1 per hour for the coming four years.”
“We hoped the authorities would see that our asks are not just fair but are in the best interests of the public and our patients and would also help prevent our doctors departing from the NHS.”
Who Are Resident Physicians?
Resident doctors have as much as eight years of experience working as a hospital doctor, based on their field, or as many as three years in primary care.
Further information will follow shortly.