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Your support makes all the difference.Around 2,800 operations in NHS hospitals have been cancelled tomorrow as a result of strike action, the Government says.
Junior health minister Ben Gummer told the House of Commons that the British Medical Association should call off tomorrow’s stoppage.
The announcement comes as Health Secretary Jeremy Hunt refused to disclose whether he vetoed a deal that would see the strike called off.
“At some point this Government needs to make a decision,” Mr Gummer told MPs.
“We have extended time and again the point at which we will introduce the new contract, precisely so we can give time for talks to proceed even though the BMA refused to discuss this for several years in a disjointed manner up until this point.
“But at some point we will have to make the changes which are necessary in order to get that consistency of service over the weekends. We cannot delay this any longer.”
The exact estimate of the operations cancelled during the 24-hour stoppage was 2,884, he said.
Despite the cancellations, emergency care will be available.
Previous academic studies however found that strikes have no overall effect on the number of patients who die on any given day.
During previous strikes it has also been pointed out that hospital cover is essentially the same as on a bank holiday such as the Queen's Jubilee.
Doctors are set to walk out again on Wednesday as the latest in a programme of rolling strikes, triggered after they voted by over 98 per cent for action.
The industrial action is being taken over a new contract proposed by Mr Hunt which would re-define anti-social hours and make it cheaper for hospitals to roster doctors on weekends and evenings.
The Government says this will improve car at the weekends and evenings but junior doctors worry that it will affect patient safety by encouraging unsafe shift patterns, and also that doctors who work the very longest hours will lose out financially.
Mr Hunt has also been personally criticised by the British Medical Journal for citing studies it published and claiming they indicated that NHS care was dangerous at weekends.
The journal’s editor accused the Health Secretary of misusing the studies and said they could not be used to justify his conclusion.
A number of polls have shown widespread public support for junior doctors in the dispute.
A spokesperson for the Department of Health said: “The BMA has continuously refused to discuss unsocial hours pay, despite their agreement to talk about this as part of ACAS in November and the progress we’ve made on safety, education and training.”
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