In your editorial on the value of face-to-face contact in healthcare (27 April), you say that there are “ongoing difficulties in recruiting enough GPs”. This may be the historic line, but currently, the crisis is not in recruitment but frozen recruitment. In 2024, there was a 44% reduction in jobs available, which is likely to be worse now. The reality is a huge and worsening unemployment crisis for fully qualified GPs, particularly those who have recently completed their (extensive and exhausting) training.
The Royal College of General Practitioners identifies this unemployment crisis, the BMA reports that unemployment is prompting GPs to move abroad, and some GPs remaining in the UK are taking up other work – for example, working as Uber drivers.
