Displaying items by tag: BMA

Scotland’s NHS faces a critical future: the British Medical Association (BMA) has warned it may not survive another year without urgent reforms. It has stressed the need for transformative changes to maintain the NHS’s founding principle of free care at the point of need. BMA chairman Dr Iain Kennedy described the system as 'in constant crisis’, with understaffed facilities leaving doctors physically and mentally exhausted. A recent survey revealed 99% of doctors are deeply concerned about increasing pressures, with many reporting dangerously overcrowded emergency departments and unsustainable workloads. Dr Kennedy called for a comprehensive workforce plan, long-term funding strategies, and integrated approaches to primary, secondary, and social care. Without reform, more people may be forced into private healthcare or left without access to necessary treatment. The Scottish government acknowledged the concerns, proposing record investments in health and social care. See also

Some medical students need to work multiple part-time jobs to afford to complete their degrees. Final year students have stopped training because they don't have enough money to survive.

For that year, they get a bursary to live on (maximum £6,458). It is not enough - especially for those from low-income backgrounds. They are campaigning for better NHS bursaries. Penny Sucharitkul hopes to be a vascular surgeon, but the money does not even cover her rent. She is from a single-parent family, and relying on Universal Credit after her father lost his job during the pandemic. On top of studying full-time, she works as a martial arts instructor and a clinical research assistant. She says working-class students are treated unfairly. ‘We're getting up at 6 am, training all day, then going to work again. It’s incredibly taxing on our mental health. We're burning people out before they've even started in the NHS.’

Doctors in the British Medical Association (BMA) will vote on decriminalisation of abortion at its annual conference (24 to 29 June). The British Pregnancy Advisory Service (BPAS) and the Royal College of Midwives (RCM) are campaigning hard for a change in the law, and senior figures in the BMA are reported to favour this. However, there is concern that pro-life arguments have not been fairly represented in the lead-up to the vote. Delegates have been given a ‘neutral’ 52-page discussion paper, written by several pro-abortion doctors, which neglects to mention the increasing survival rate of premature babies. The latest official figures show that 190,406 women had abortions in 2016: alarmingly, these included more than 1,500 girls under the age of consent. Also, more babies with Down’s syndrome were aborted than in 2015 (such abortions have increased by 46 per cent since 2010). This debate comes as research shows that many are uneasy about the current law and favour reducing the period during which abortion is legal. See