Time to consider new curbs on NHS strikes

Apost-war record for the number of excess deaths outside a pandemic was recorded in Britain last year. Analysis by this newspaper showed that nearly 53,000 more people died in 2023 than would normally be expected.

Why is this? Some say that it is the legacy of an overlong Covid lockdown underpinned by a state campaign to limit the use of the NHS by other patients. As a result, people with conditions such as cancer, which might have been treatable if caught earlier, presented themselves too late.

Unlike with Covid, moreover, the excess deaths are disproportionately affecting middle-aged people between 50 and 64.

There were lockdowns in countries such as France and Germany that do not show the same level of excess deaths. Is it that their health systems are superior to ours and, if so, why do we not emulate them?

However, there is something else that is evidently having a profound effect in Britain – the series of strikes which, over the past year or so, have involved nursing staff, ambulance services, consultants and junior doctors.

Some of these have been settled but today junior doctors are beginning a six-day stoppage, the longest in the 75-year history of the NHS. Last year they were on strike for 38 days. It is inconceivable that a health system in almost continuous crisis mode can function properly amid such disruption.

Appointments are cancelled, operations postponed and patients have to go back to square one, sometimes involving another trip to a GP for their treatment to be rescheduled. How many drop out at that point?

The backlog of cases is above seven million with no chance of a significant reduction for as long as this dispute persists. The doctors say that it could be settled if the Government sits down and negotiates and yet they are asking for a 35 per cent pay rise, which is absurd.

How can they leave people who rely on their help to suffer and die? To withdraw their labour for almost a week in January when hospitals are already full with the elderly and young babies afflicted by respiratory ailments is unconscionable.

The BMA has been told this strike will cause a serious and long-lasting impact but seems not to care. The time has come to consider legislation to stop doctors going on strike just as police officers, prison warders and members of the Armed Forces are forbidden to do so.