Resident Doctors in the UK to Stage Five-Day Strike Next Month
Doctors in England are set to stage a five consecutive day strike next month, due to disputes regarding pay and employment.
Walkout Information
The British Medical Association (BMA) announced that resident doctors 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 medical staff in the National Health Service, are proceeding with the strike 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 been negotiating for the past week 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 facing unemployment, their talents being unused whilst millions of patients endure long waits for care and shifts in hospitals remain vacant. This cannot continue.”
He continued, “We negotiated sincerely, hoping the minister to understand that a agreement offering solutions to slowly restore the cuts to pay over a number of years, giving recent graduates a raise of only £1 per hour for the coming four years.”
“We trusted the authorities would see that our asks are not just fair but are in the interest of the public and our patients and would also help stop our physicians departing from the NHS.”
Who Are Resident Physicians?
Resident doctors have as much as eight years of experience practicing in hospitals, depending on their specialty, or as many as three years in primary care.
More details will follow shortly.
