The Government’s handling of the COVID-19 crisis has led to over 1,000 NHS doctors wanting to leave the NHS according to our new survey. Doctors.net reported our findings.
More than a thousand doctors are ready to leave the NHS because of their unhappiness at the management of the COVID-19 pandemic, according to a survey.
Some 69% of doctors taking part in the survey said they were more likely to leave the NHS because of their experience of the pandemic.
The Doctors’ Association, which organised the survey of 1,758 doctors, said that delays, statistical manipulation and obfuscation had all angered doctors.
The association said ministers had been happy to “clap for the NHS” but had failed to deliver real signs of appreciation for doctors – excluding many from a “much vaunted” pay rise.
65% of doctors said PPE shortage were putting their lives at risk while 46% cited the abandoning of promises made during the pandemic, such as the offer of free car parking.
23% cited the impact of the pandemic on their family and 20% cited the treatment of overseas doctors. 45% said the pandemic had an impact on their mental health.
Association president Dr Samantha Batt-Rawden said:
NHS doctors have come out of this pandemic battered, bruised and burnt out. These are dedicated professionals who have put their lives on the line time and time again to keep patients in the NHS safe, and we could be about to lose them. These figures are a shocking indictment of the government’s failure to value our nation’s doctors.
It is abhorrent that promises made during the pandemic to look after our frontline staff are already being taken away, at a time when we are still mourning colleagues and the true mental health impact of the pandemic on healthcare workers is only just coming to the fore.
Crueller still is the inexplicable decisions to exclude junior doctors, GPs, nurses and paramedics from an above the board pay rise, resulting in yet another real terms cut. The Government seems to have a very short memory to abandon the very same people that they clapped for every single Thursday just months ago.
Frontline staff have been left feeling exploited and expendable. Is it any wonder so many are now making plans to leave once the pandemic is over?
Full article: https://news.doctors.net.uk/news/31864 (login required)
