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 The British Medical Association (BMA) trade union on Wednesday
backed plans for a full walkout of junior doctors from 0700 GMT to
1600 GMT for five days from Sept. 12, the longest in the near
70-year history of the National Health Service.
Junior doctors, a term which covers recent medical school graduates
right through to doctors who have been working for well over a
decade, have staged a series of walk-outs over a new contract the
government plans to impose next month.
The government says the new arrangements are part of its plan to
bring in a safer and fuller seven-day health service, but the
doctors say it will result in them working longer hours at
anti-social times, putting patients at risk.
"The way to resolve those differences is to sit round the table to
talk, it is cooperation and dialogue, it is not confrontation and
strikes. That is why I think this action is totally irresponsible,"
Hunt told BBC Radio.
He said around 100,000 operations could be canceled as a result of
the action.
In May, the BMA and the government reached a deal to end the
standoff but its members then voted to reject the new terms and
conditions.
The BMA said concerns focus on the impact the contract will have on
part-time workers and those who work the most weekends.
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"This is not a situation junior doctors wanted to find themselves in
... but in forcing through a contract that junior doctors have
rejected and which they don't believe is good for their patients or
themselves, the government has left them with no other choice," BMA
junior doctor committee chair Ellen McCourt said in a statement.
There are some 55,000 junior doctors in England, about a third of
the medical workforce. NHS services in Scotland, Wales and Northern
Ireland, are managed separately from England.
(Reporting by Kylie MacLellan)
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