It comes as the country grinds to a halt with rail strikes – at a time when traffic chaos has been compounded by the icy weather – and the third day of six days of action by Royal Mail staff, delaying thousands of cards and gifts.
On Wednesday, health chiefs wrote to all NHS trusts saying they had “real concerns” about the level of risk to patients ahead of a national strike by nurses.
The letter from Danny Mortimer, head of NHS Employers, said: “There are areas where we are disappointed that we have not been able to make more progress with the RCN, with limited national derogations for cancer services being a particular area of concern.”
The waivers relate to the areas of care that nurses agree to cover during a strike.
In recent days, health leaders have pleaded with the union to ensure cancer patients are spared potentially deadly delays.
A letter from the RCN, seen by the Telegraph, confirmed cancer services would not be exempt from Thursday’s strikes.
Although an exception has been drawn up for chemotherapy, for other cancer patients the RCN has only agreed to “review specific very urgent interventions on a patient-by-patient basis”.
The correspondence, sent on Tuesday night, came in response to safety concerns raised by the UK’s four chief nurses about the level of cover the union plans to provide during the strikes.
He indicated that some concessions had been made, including actions to ensure that dying patients could receive pain relief.
But on Wednesday, NHS employers expressed concern that the situation remained precarious – and warned that a wave of future strikes was likely, with even fewer safeguards.
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