Doctors are demanding the right to go on “heat strike” as the UK basks in temperatures upwards of 30°C, arguing that NHS staff should not be forced to work in conditions above a certain temperature. The Telegraph has more.
A surge of hot weather will see temperatures increase to more than 30°C this week and over the weekend, prompting a health warning from officials.
It comes as senior doctors announced they would be voting on members’ appetite to strike with an “indicative ballot” after receiving an “insulting” 4% pay rise this year.
The “heat strike” motion put forward by members of the British Medical Association (BMA) is calling on the union to demand that the NHS adopts a “national maximum workplace temperature”.
It said the BMA should support staff to take “heat strike action” if the temperature rises any higher than that, allowing all non-essential staff to walk out.
A threshold should be set using available evidence, it added. Some estimates suggest that staff concentration is affected at 24°C, while the NHS says vulnerable patients could suffer at 26°C.
The proposals, which also call for funding to keep NHS buildings cool enough to work, have been put forward by the BMA’s London regional council to be voted on at its annual meeting next week.
It said that there was “evidence linking workplace heat to stress, poor health outcomes, reduced performance and decreased patient safety” and that the “escalating climate and health emergency is increasing the frequency and severity of heatwaves in the UK, such that extreme working temperatures are very likely to become ever more common”.
If medics can’t work above 25° it’s a miracle anywhere south of Devon has healthcare at all. Alternatively, and more likely, the NHS is, quite literally, staffed by snowflakes.
Worth reading in full.
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