Striking doctor has it out with Wes Streeting | LBC

During Health Secretary Wes Streeting's phone-in with Shelagh Fogarty, LBC caller Shivam from the striking BMA wanted to challenge the minister directly. Streeting called five days of strikes by resident doctors in England ‘unprecedented’ as he called for them to abandon their action. He said the walkouts risk undermining work the government has done to improve the health service. It comes as new data shows the waiting list for routine hospital treatment in England has fallen for the second consecutive month to its lowest in more than two years. However, the number of patients facing the longest waits increased, according to NHS figures. An estimated 7.36 million treatments were waiting to be carried out in England at the end of May, relating to just under 6.23 million patients - down from 7.39 million treatments and just over 6.23 million patients at the end of April. These are the lowest figures since March 2023 for treatments and April 2023 for patients. The number of patients waiting more than 18 months to start routine treatment also fell to 1,237 in May from 1,361 in April. However, some 11,522 people were waiting more than 65 weeks to start treatment, up from 9,258 in the previous month. The number of patients waiting more than 52 weeks also increased for the second consecutive month - to 196,920, up from 190,068 at the end of April - after falling for 10 months in a row.