NHS facing 48-hour ‘standstill’ when more strikes start tomorrow

The NHS will be ‘at a standstill’ for 48 hours as one of the toughest strikes in its history begins tomorrow.

Medical director Sir Stephen Powis warned of mass disruption across the health service as consultant doctors move to provide only emergency cover from 7am on Thursday until 7am on Saturday.

It follows the longest period of industrial action by junior doctors, which ended after five days on Tuesday morning.

No other clinicians can provide cover for consultants, so any planned care delivered by junior doctors that requires their supervision will need to be rescheduled.

This means a ‘significant amount’ of planned care involving junior doctors will be affected.

It is believed tens of thousands of appointments were postponed during the five-day strike, but experts fear the impact from consultants walking out will be even bigger.

Sir Stephen said: ‘This could undoubtedly be the most severe impact we have ever seen in the NHS as a result of industrial action, with routine care virtually at a standstill for 48 hours.

‘Consultants will not only stop seeing patients themselves, but they won’t be around to provide supervision over the work of junior doctors, which impacts thousands of appointments for patients.

‘It also follows on very closely from the longest-ever junior doctors’ strike, which itself affected thousands of appointments, with back-to-back action leaving NHS services with almost no time to recover.

‘We are working closely with the British Medical Association [BMA] and British Dental Association to ensure that emergency and urgent care is prioritised and patients remain safe, but in the eighth month of industrial action, and with more than 600,000 appointments already affected, it’s becoming even more challenging to get services back on track after each round of action.’

The public is still advised to dial 999 in life-threatening emergencies and contact NHS 111 online for other health concerns. GP services and pharmacies will also be running as normal.

Last week the Government announced pay increases for millions of public-sector workers, including doctors. Most eligible dentists and doctors will receive at least a 6% pay rise.

Rishi Sunak said the deal was the ‘final offer’ and claimed there would be ‘no more talks on pay’.

But the BMA said the increase was a ‘savage real-terms pay cut’ and called it ‘derisory’.

Following the announcement, consultants said they would also strike for two more days on August 24 and 25.

In a letter to health secretary Steve Barclay, the BMA accused the Government of ‘not taking the situation seriously’.

It added: ‘The Prime Minister stated bullishly that there will be no more negotiations, as if there had been a full process already that had reached its conclusion. This is clearly not the case.

‘It is still not too late, we remain willing to talk and call on you to meet with us and present us with a credible offer so that we can call off industrial action and put it to our members.’

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