At a glance

Hundreds of junior doctors gathered for a rally in Birmingham city centre on the fourth day of industrial action.

Staff across the country walked out on Tuesday in a row over pay, with the BMA union asking for a 35% pay rise.

Doctors at the rally on Edgbaston Street near the Bullring shopping centre held signs calling for change and saying they were overworked and underpaid.

The union and the government are yet to reach an agreement, with the government calling the union's demands "unreasonable".

One of the junior doctors on strike was Birmingham-born Dr Arjan Singh.

Now working in London, and a member of the BMA's junior doctor committee, he said he had dreamed of being a doctor since he was five years old.

"These are the hospitals I went to when I was a kid," he said.

"When I went to these hospitals as a patient, the NHS was ranked as gold standard but we don't have a National Health Service any more, we have a national disgrace."

He said junior doctors had been pushed to the end of the tether and it was "soul destroying providing care that is sub-standard".

It is thought the four-day strike meant more than a quarter of a million appointments and operations had to be cancelled.

The junior doctors said that as well as striking for what they call "pay restoration", they are also campaigning for improvements to patient safety.

Dr Sumi Manirajan, also a member of the BMA junior doctor committee, was at the rally and said more and more doctors were thinking of leaving the NHS.

"I know most of my colleagues are thinking of leaving, I've considered this myself," she said.

"I think for most doctors they see this [strike] as the last opportunity to solve this."

Related Topics