Doctors strike – what's different this time?

Sky News Daily

Thursday, 24 July 2025 - 19 minutes

The doctors' union, the British Medical Association, is calling for a pay rise of 29.2% to reverse "pay erosion" since 2008/09. The government has offered 5.4%. In previous strikes, around 1.5 million appointments were cancelled or rescheduled, but this time hospitals have been told to cancel non-urgent work only in "exceptional circumstances". In today’s episode, Niall Paterson talks to Sky’s health correspondent Ashish Joshi about how the NHS will deal with the walkout and also to resident doctor Bhasha Mukherjee about why she voted for strike action. Producer: Emily Hulme Editor: Wendy Parker