One of the longest strikes by health workers began in England on Wednesday 3 January. In particular, the strike was called by “junior doctors”, i.e. a doctor who, after graduating from medical school, begins a training period that can last from 8 to 12 years. It was announced that the strike would last six days, one of the longest in 75 years. Other strikes have been called in recent months, but they have lasted a maximum of four days in a row. The strike is being led by the British Medical Association, the trade union and professional body for doctors and medical students in the UK.

The reason why all these young professionals are striking is that salaries have not kept pace with rising costs. Other reasons include increasingly long shifts and a rise in burnout, the syndrome of mental and emotional exhaustion in the workplace.With regard to the first point – unadjusted wages – it can be argued that it is both a result of the continuous cuts in public health spending, which have been promoted by the last four Conservative governments, and a result of the rise in inflation. In fact, it has been recorded that between 2008 and 2022 there will be a 26 per cent fall in the real value of junior doctors’ salaries.

The junior doctors are demanding a 35 per cent pay rise and, to prevent this from happening again in the future, they are also calling for the introduction of a mezzanine system, so that salaries are adjusted to the cost of living.The government initially responded by offering to increase pay by 8 per cent, and later by 11 per cent, but the union refused.

This is not just a problem for health workers, with several social workers’ strikes in England beginning in late 2022 and continuing throughout 2023,  and involving various categories of workers such as teachers and taxi drivers.

Patient advocacy groups are concerned about the negative impact of strikes on the health of patients themselves, as well as further lengthening waiting times for millions of people on National Health Service (NHS) waiting lists. On the other hand, the unions argue that the strike is necessary to preserve the NHS. The British Medical Association highlights the shortage of doctors in the system, which it attributes not only to the limited number of medical graduates each year, but also to working conditions that drive many professionals to leave the profession or seek work abroad. This phenomenon appears to be a problem not only in the UK, but also in other countries such as Italy.

The issue seems to highlight a number of challenges, including the need to ensure a sufficient number of trained doctors, to improve working conditions to reduce the migration of health professionals, and to find solutions to address the current situation without compromising the health of patients