Resident Doctors in the UK to Launch Five Consecutive Day Strike in November
Doctors in England are preparing to stage a five consecutive day walkout next month, in protest over pay and employment.
Walkout Information
The British Medical Association (BMA) announced that resident doctors will walk out for five consecutive days from November 14 at 7am to 7am on 19 November.
Resident doctors, who make up about half of all medical staff in the National Health Service, are proceeding with the strike after unsuccessful talks with the health department.
Causes of the Walkout
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 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 countless individuals wait endlessly for treatment and hospital shifts go unfilled. This cannot continue.”
He continued, “We negotiated sincerely, keen for the health secretary to understand that a agreement including options to slowly restore the cuts to pay over a number of years, giving newly trained doctors a pay increase of just a pound an hour for the coming four years.”
“We trusted the authorities would recognize that our demands are not just reasonable but are in the best interests of the public and our those we treat and would also help stop our doctors departing from the NHS.”
About Resident Doctors
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.
More details are expected shortly.
