Why I won’t be joining the consultants on strike

I won’t be joining the consultants who are striking today. Though I fully support the legitimate concerns of my colleagues in the medical and other health professions taking part in industrial action across the NHS, I feel the toll this is taking on patients is unjustifiable.

This is not a decision I take lightly. When I was a junior doctor, I was very active in the original strikes that took place in 2016 opposing the new junior doctor contract. It is tempting to put this down to being young and naïve, but things were different back then: we were opposing the unilateral imposition of a new junior doctor contract rather than disputing an existing one; the healthcare system had not yet been crippled by the Covid pandemic; and the UK was in a much better position economically compared to the unemployment and financial struggles we are facing as a nation today.