Resident Physicians in the UK to Begin Five Consecutive Day Strike Next Month

Doctors in the UK are preparing to begin a five-day walkout in November, due to disputes regarding jobs and pay.

Strike Details

The BMA stated that resident doctors will walk out for five days in a row from 7am on 14 November to 7am on 19 November.

Resident doctors, who constitute nearly 50% 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 stated, “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 unemployed physicians.”

“Our survey reveals 50% of second-year physicians in the UK are facing unemployment, their talents being unused whilst millions of patients wait endlessly for treatment and hospital shifts go unfilled. This is a situation which cannot go on.”

He continued, “We talked with the government in good faith, keen for the health secretary to see that a agreement including options to slowly restore the cuts to pay over several years, giving recent graduates a pay increase of only £1 per hour for the next four years.”

“We hoped the authorities would recognize that our demands are not just reasonable but are in the interest of the public and our patients and would also help prevent our physicians leaving the NHS.”

About Resident Doctors

Junior physicians have anywhere up to eight years’ experience working as a hospital doctor, based on their field, or up to three years in primary care.

Further information will follow soon.