Junior doctors in England have launched a fifth round of industrial action, with thousands going on strike just days after starting their first NHS jobs.
The strike action comes less than 24 hours after figures revealed the waiting list of people awaiting treatment had climbed to a record high of 7.6 million.
Sir Julian Hartley, the chief executive of NHS Providers, said cancellations could hit a million after strikes by junior doctors and consultants in August.
The NHS Confederation has called the government’s “business as usual” approach to strike action “dangerous” and urged it to reopen talks with doctors.
Steve Barclay, the health secretary, said patients were “bearing the brunt of the impact of continuous strikes” and the fresh round “will cause more appointments and procedures to be postponed”.
He added: “My door is always open to discuss how to improve doctors’ working lives, but this pay award is final so I urge the BMA to end its strikes immediately.”
How can the NHS be so incredibly underfunded? Hell, even Canada is bleeding doctors because of long hours and low pay, and our salaries look downright exceptional compared to this.
No I don't think we should be pushing for this. But the doctor's themselves absolutely should.
They've clearly said the renumeration and stress levels in th NHS system are unacceptable. Hence the strikes. Many have signaled that they would rather work in non NHS style health systems because of the pay and quality of life improvements. Good for them.
As hard as it might be to hear this maybe it's time to rethink how well the NHS system is working. Not for patients (but also that) but for the workers within in. A key tranche of which are so pissed off with it that they want to move to Australia.