Junior doctors' strike risks patient safety - Jeremy Hunt

[Northerner]

Planned all-out strikes by junior doctors in England this week could threaten the safety of patients, Health Secretary Jeremy Hunt has warned.

Hospitals are making final preparations for the latest walkouts - on Tuesday and Wednesday - when emergency care will be affected for the first time.

Mr Hunt said the "extreme" action would be "deeply worrying for patients".

The BMA said it would call off the strike if Mr Hunt's threat to impose a contract on junior doctors was lifted.

Junior doctors are planning two one-day strikes on Tuesday and Wednesday - walking out between 08:00 BST and 17:00 BST each day.

If they go ahead, it will be the first time in the history of the NHS that junior doctors have walked out of accident and emergency units, urgent maternity services, resuscitation and mental health crisis teams.

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/health-36126740

Hate this sort of brinkmanship. How can there be any further negotiation if Hunt refuses to suspend imposition?

 

[Diabeticliberty]

I have a warning of my own. The dogmatic actions by Mr. Hunt are what are really threatening patient safety. Not only does he threaten patient safety but he also threatens the NHS. Lets face facts this is his end game. The BMA have made and continue to make repeated efforts to apply the brakes to what is fast becoming a runaway train that can only have one outcome which is of course a massive train wreck. I do not have a left wing agenda nor do I have a right wing agenda. My personal belief is that the NHS should be above all of that. It is far too important to all of us for any politician to use it to show how bloody minded he can be. At the extreme end of this there is a very cold and very hard fact which is that we need the doctors far more than they need all of us. The thing is though they really still seem to want to do right by us. In return we should all want to do right by them. As a mark of this I believe we should offer them our total and complete support. If they are forced to withdraw their support for their patients which in the circumstances you couldn't really blame them for doing so then we are all completely screwed

 

[Northerner]

What really annoys me is Hunt repeatedly saying that a 7-da NHS was in the manifesto and they have a mandate to deliver that. Yes, that may be true (under our misrepresentative system) but just saying something and wishing it doesn't make it happen. Currently, the government are destroying the investment made in all previous years when we supported the NHS and are driving away people from the organisation, as well as discouraging people from joining it. How can this possibly be for the good of the nation? It can't, it's driven by politics and the self-interest of a small, greed-driven cabal

 

[Northerner]

They had a very eloquent junior doctor on the 'Daily Politics' this lunchtime, setting out the problems very clearly. In the studio was a Tory sheep parroting the government line about it all being about Saturday pay, even though the doctor had clearly explained why that wasn't the issue - several times. A feature of this and the last parliament has been how politicians have become unable to articulate an answer to a question - instead they ignore it and simply repeat what they have been told to say. We could save a lot of money if we dispensed with any politician who was unable to formulate his/her own ideas and speak for themselves - they think they are being so clever evading the questions, but it is highly insulting to the intelligence of anyone with a basic command of English and exposes their shallow, feeble-minded, hypocritical characters

 

[Annette]

Unfortunately, it seems to be invading the doctors camp as well. Head the BMA bloke (Mark Porter?) this morning trying not to answer the question he had been asked, several times. (He failed in the end and had to answer it cos the presenter wouldnt move on until he had an answer. He'll never make a polititian...)