Junior doctors to go on 72-hour strike in England

Continuing theirdemand for pay raise, Junior doctors in England will go on strike for three days, 13, 14 and 15 March, the British Medical Association (BMA) has said. According to the BMA, young doctors are at a loss for options after Health Secretary Steve Barclay "refused to attend" a meeting to discuss their wages.

The strike will involve no work, which meansno emergency cover and on-call shifts.

In a recent ballot, over 40,000 junior doctorschose to engage in industrial action, and hospital trusts and employers have now been informed that the 72-hour walkout will take place. Junior doctors are overall 40% of the medical workforce. Sharing their woes, the BMA union said the junior doctors are "demoralised, angry and no longer willing to work for wages that have seen a real terms decline of over 26% in the past 15 years".

"We have not been told why we have not been offered intensive negotiations nor what we need to do for the government to begin negotiations with us."

"We are left with no option but to proceed with this action," the BMA junior doctors' committee said.

Meanwhile, British Dental Association announced that dentists under the junior contract will also join the walkout. Association chairman Eddie Crouch said, “This small but important group of dentists are working to the same contracts as their medical colleagues, and like them are not worth a penny less than they were 15 years ago."

“Our members will down drills until the government comes back to the table with a serious offer.”

Dr Rob Laurenson and Dr Vivek Trivedi, co-chairs of the BMA junior doctors’ committee, said, “Make no mistake, this strike was absolutely in the government’s gift to avert; they know it, we know it and our patients also need to know it. We have tried, since last summer, to get each health secretary we have had, around the negotiating table."

“We have written many times and even as late as yesterday we were hopeful Steve Barclay would recognise the need to meet with us to find a workable solution that could have averted this strike. We have not been told why we have not been offered intensive negotiations nor what we need to do for the government to begin negotiations with us. We are left with no option but to proceed with this action.”

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