Planned NHS hospital care in England will be “virtually at a standstill” on Thursday and Friday when consultants stage their first strike in a decade, the service’s top doctor said.
Their two-day strike over pay will cause “the most severe impact we have ever seen in the NHS as a result of industrial action”, Prof Sir Stephen Powis said on Wednesday.
Thousands of consultants will hold what they have made clear will be the first in a rolling series of stoppages unless the government improves its offer of a 6% pay rise.
The consultants’ action comes as the NHS is recovering from a five-day strike – the longest in its history – that junior doctors held from last Thursday until yesterday.
Their strike means that the service will be able to operate at the level of service usually seen on Christmas Day. Consultants will still work in areas of urgent and emergency care, such as A&E, intensive care, emergency surgery and maternity services.
However, most outpatient appointments and non-urgent – or elective – operations, such as hip and knee replacements and cataract removals, will be postponed and rescheduled.
Steve Barclay, the health secretary, has criticised consultants for striking despite him last week awarding them a 6% salary increase. But consultants say they have suffered a 35% drop in the real-terms value of their income since 2008-09 and are seeking “full pay restoration”.
Their absence at the end of the week will have a double impact, Powis said.
“Consultants will not only stop seeing patients themselves but they won’t be around to provide supervision over the work of junior doctors, which impacts thousands of appointments for patients.”
Matthew Taylor, the chief executive of the NHS Confederation, which represents health service trusts, said that hospital bosses were expecting “serious disruption” to care.
Hospital-based dentists will also join the strike, which has been called by the British Medical Association. Consultants plan to strike for another 48 hours on 24 and 25 August unless Barclay improves his offer, which he has refused to do.
“While there are plans in place for Christmas Day levels of cover in emergency care, the patience of patients may be tested as wider services are reduced and operations postponed”, Taylor added.
The BMA has defended the strike. Doctors are justified in taking industrial action given the huge cut in their salaries over many years, it has said.
It held several weeks of discussions with Barclay in a bid to make progress on its pay claim. But the gap between his offer and their demand proved too wide, making strikes unavoidable.
