More than 7,000 cancer operations have been postponed as a result of junior doctors’ strikes, leaked NHS figures show, with surgeries for the most deadly cases amongst those delayed.
As the country braces for a fresh wave of walk outs by the doctors, data has revealed that there has been a reduction by 27 per cent in cancer surgeries.
Even those patients with the most time-sensitive of cancers, such as lung, head and neck tumours, have faced delays increasing the risk of growth and spread across the body.
From Saturday thousands of medics demanding pay hikes of up to 35 per cent will down their tools for a four day walk out after the British Medical Association (BMA) claimed the Government failed to meet its deadline.
Health officials, however, are urging the militant medical union to protect cancer patients from further action revealing the potentially lethal impact the strikes may have. But the BMA has refused to agree to any such agreement as of yet.
More than 7,000 cancer operations have been postponed as a result of junior doctors’ strikes, leaked NHS figures show. Pictured: A NHS worker striking in September
From Saturday thousands of medics demanding pay hikes of up to 35 per cent will down their tools for a four day walk out. Pictured: Jeremy Corbyn joins striking junior doctors in January
On Monday, NHS England’s national cancer director Dame Cally Palmer and Professor Peter Johnson, clinical director for cancer, sent a memo to medical directors in charge of England’s cancer network.
The note, as reported by the Telegraph, read: ‘NHSE analysis suggests that, despite the efforts by colleagues across the country to maintain services wherever possible, there has been a 27 per cent reduction in cancer surgery during periods of industrial action by junior doctors [equivalent to more than 7,000 fewer cancer operations since March 2023] and that this scale of reduction has been replicated even for time-sensitive cancers’.
It said that hospital had taken two weeks to catch up on procedures not carried out during strike days.
Cancer centres have been asked to provide further details on how many operations were delayed on each day of strike action compared with an average day.
Dame Cally told the paper: ‘The NHS is working incredibly hard to maintain provision of urgent cancer surgery on strike days, but it is right to say that we are growing increasingly concerned about the risk of harm to patients.
‘That’s why we are in active discussions with the BMA to agree to safety mitigations for patients, and people should continue to come forward, either for checks or their appointment, unless told otherwise.’
Caroline Johnson, a Tory MP and doctor, added: ‘Doctors contemplating further strike action should consider whether they can live with knowing they are leaving cancer patients to wait in order to get themselves more money.’
Meanwhile Cancer Research’s UK chief executive urged all parties to ‘work together to quickly reach an agreement’ and ensure those suffering with cancer are not affected.
More than a million appointments and operations have been cancelled because of the never-ending wave of NHS strikes that kicked off in 2022.
This weeks strikes will commence from 7am on February 24 until just before midnight on February 28, meaning they will cover five days in total.
In a joint statement, the BMA junior doctors committee co-chairs Dr Robert Laurenson and Dr Vivek Trivedi said the strikes could have been averted had the Government agreed to come to the negotiating table.
‘Even yesterday we were willing to delay further strike action in exchange for a short extension of our current strike mandate,’ they said,
‘Had the Health Secretary agreed to this, an act of good faith on both sides, talks could have gone ahead without more strikes. Sadly, the Government declined.
‘The glacial speed of progress with the Government is frustrating and incomprehensible.’
They added that despite Ms Atkins’s statements during the last round of strike action that she would meet junior doctors ‘in twenty minutes’ when no strikes were planned, it was more than 20 days before they were offered a meeting.
But they said the union is still willing to cancel the upcoming strikes if a credible pay offer is made.
‘From the very start of the industrial action, we have been clear that there is no need for strike action as long as substantial progress is made, and we remain willing to carry on talking and to cancel the forthcoming strikes if significant progress is made and a credible offer is put forward,’ they said.