Seòmar agus comataidhean

The Scottish Government provides baseline funding to NHS Boards and it is for Boards to determine how to use this funding to meet the healthcare needs of their resident population.

In 2021-22, Health funding exceeds £16 billion with £11.6 billion allocated to our frontline Health Boards, and a further £1.9 billion to address pressures relating to Covid-19 across health and social care.

Detail on how funding has been used specifically for the assessment and treatment of deep vein thrombosis would require to be requested from NHS Boards.

As a result of the Covid-19 pandemic, Ministers agreed to move the date of Scotland’s Census from March 2021 to March 2022. This decision was taken to address significant pandemic risks to the successful completion of the census and to the delivery of the benefits required by the people of Scotland.

The impact of an extra year adds to the programme lifecycle cost, with the major financial implications of the move to 2022 being:

• The cost of extending suppliers contracts; and
• The programme’s headcount being maintained for an extra year.

National Records of Scotland (NRS) undertook significant engagement with the multiple census suppliers, with initial and final repricing exercises, interrogation of costs and an extensive resource planning exercise. This work assessed estimated additional costs of up to £21.6m for the delivery of Scotland’s Census in 2022 across the remaining lifecycle of the programme.

NRS continues to deliver against the revised plan with arrangements for Scotland’s Census 2022 well advanced.

As advised in response to the question S6W-03892, the booster vaccination programme is administered by health boards and GP practices. NHS health board costs across Scotland will vary depending on their location, cost structures, and local delivery mechanisms.

The Scottish Government is conscious of demonstrating value for the public pound and to this extent, it costs £12.58 per vaccination dose (whether first, second, third or booster) when administered by GP practices.

Most people were able to access the NHS Scotland Covid Status App without difficulty from launch. Where people experienced difficulties it was when they requested access to their vaccination status through the app after having verified their identity. This process involved the app linking to an existing NHS system. There was an extremely high number of initial users trying to access this NHS system that matched a verified an individual with their health record at the same time. This led to the system being overwhelmed for a short period and a related fault developing in the NHS system that routed these requests. The fault, along with the required fix, was identified within the first 24 hours and the fix successfully implemented on the evening of 1 October. The backlog of health record matching requests had been cleared within 48 hours of the app being launched, during which time people who experienced difficulties at that time could continue to use their paper version, or their PDF downloaded copy.

NHS health boards lead on the local delivery of the COVID-19 vaccination programme. Vaccination centres have frequently changed throughout the programme, with some facilities being repurposed, and drop-in clinics being made available as we have had to exercise flexibility.

As such, the Scottish Government do not hold the requested level of information as the number changes frequently.

Further Information regarding the number of vaccination centres operating in each health board area, and their opening hours can be found on NHS inform.

Booster vaccinations in Scotland started as soon as possible once the Joint Committee on Vaccination and Immunisation (JCVI) provided their advice on boosters. In response to the changing risk posed by the Omicron variant, the booster will now be given no sooner than 3 months after the primary course.

1,961,588 people have received a booster or 3rd dose to 8 December, and we are working as quickly as we can, prioritising those most vulnerable.

Data is published at COVID-19 Daily Dashboard | Tableau Public which includes boosters and 3rd doses delivered per JCVI cohort.

We continue to work closely with Public Health Scotland to develop the vaccination data to provide robust statistics that enhance public understanding.

While demographic difference make robust comparisons difficult, figures from the UK dashboard show we have administered boosters or 3rd doses to a greater proportion of the population than the other UK nations at this stage of the programme.

We are aiming to offer the booster vaccine to everyone aged 18 or older who is eligible by the end of January 2022.

This information is not held centrally.

GP practice records show lists of acute and repeat prescribed medication lists during consultations with quantities of medication prescribed. Over ordering of repeat medication (or repeated consultations for acute prescriptions) are therefore visible on the acute and repeat prescribing sections of the medical records. It is therefore possible to add minimum days before reordering of monthly repeat medications to help prevent medication being ordered early or alert future prescribers to the potential for suspected addiction. ‘Special notes’ can be added or alerts to the patient record in daytime practice to inform prescribers of previous medication seeking behaviour or suspected addiction to pain medication. This information can be added to the patients ‘Special notes’ to be visible to Out of Hours services. Scottish Government is developing tools to accurately display prescribing habits to clinicians during consultations in order to help identify medication (including analgesic) over/under use.

Substance misuse services (often catering for drugs and alcohol misuse) are accessible either by open access or through GP referral to these services for review and support. These vary across Health boards with regards to support and resource available and mode of initial access.

I refer the member to the answer to question S6W-04313 on 3 December 2021. All answers to written parliamentary questions are available on the Parliament’s website, the search facility for which can be found at https://www.parliament.scot/chamber-and-committees/written-questions-and-answers.

Further to this answer, I can update that the public consultation on the draft Framework for Pain Management Service Delivery is now available at https://www.gov.scot/publications/draft-framework-chronic-pain-service-delivery .