A junior doctor announced his intention to resign live on television out of frustration over the new contract.
Dr Ben White told viewers of ITV's Good Morning Britain that he would be leaving his post as a trainee doctor to join the legal campaign against the contract.
Junior doctors are set to start an all-out strike at 8am on Tuesday and the NHS has already cancelled 125,000 operations and appointments in preparation.
Dr White assured patients that if they are unwell they should go to hospital as consultants would be covering emergency care.
He said: "I have taken the decision that I am resigning as a trainee doctor to focus on a legal campaign to fight the contract on behalf of my patients and on behalf of the NHS."
Asked why it had come to this, he was visibly upset and said: "I really feel like we have been backed into a corner and there's not a lot of sense coming out of the Government's side of things.
"We have to put patients first and we can see at the moment the understaffing and the underfunding in the NHS."
On Sunday, the Health Secretary Jeremy Hunt rejected a last-minute attempt to bring about an end to next week’s all-out strike of junior doctors describing the initiative as “Labour opportunism”.
Mr Hunt dismissed a letter from the shadow Health Secretary, Heidi Alexander, urging him to agree to trial the new junior doctors' contract rather than impose it across the NHS unilaterally.
The letter, which was also signed by two former heath ministers – including a Conservative - also said there should be an independent evaluation of the so-called "weekend effect" which sees higher mortality rates for patients admitted at weekends.
A BMA source said they supported the initiative and that if the Government agreed to limited trials of a pilot of the contract, representatives would be prepared to meet them to discuss the possibility of calling off the strike on Tuesday and Wednesday.
The walkout would see all junior doctors, including Accident & Emergency staff, walk out – the first time such action has been taken in NHS history by doctors.
PA
