- Asked by: Miles Briggs, MSP for Lothian, Scottish Conservative and Unionist Party
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Date lodged: Thursday, 07 May 2020
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Current Status:
Answered by Jeane Freeman on 26 May 2020
To ask the Scottish Government how many independent care home residents have been tested for COVID-19.
Answer
The Scottish Government does not hold this information. Public Health Scotland provides the Scottish Government with numbers of residents and staff tested in care homes, but it is not possible to disaggregate this further to provide a breakdown of the type of care home the data comes from .
- Asked by: Miles Briggs, MSP for Lothian, Scottish Conservative and Unionist Party
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Date lodged: Wednesday, 06 May 2020
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Current Status:
Answered by Jeane Freeman on 26 May 2020
To ask the Scottish Government how many (a) men and (b) women with blood cancer in each age group have (i) contracted and (ii) died from COVID-19, also broken down by how many had received intensive care support.
Answer
The Scottish Government does not hold the total number of men or women with blood cancer, in each age group, who have contacted or died from COVID-19. National Records of Scotland have recently published statistics on Deaths Involving Coronavirus (COVID-19) in Scotland, which can be found by following this link: https://www.nrscotland.gov.uk/files/statistics/covid19/covid-deaths-report-week-18.pdf . The Scottish Government also does not hold the intensive care information requested by the member.
- Asked by: Miles Briggs, MSP for Lothian, Scottish Conservative and Unionist Party
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Date lodged: Tuesday, 21 April 2020
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Current Status:
Answered by Jeane Freeman on 20 May 2020
To ask the Scottish Government how much hospital waste is being stored in each NHS board.
Answer
Clinical waste is regularly collected from Health Board sites. This arrangement means clinical waste is not stored for prolonged periods.
- Asked by: Miles Briggs, MSP for Lothian, Scottish Conservative and Unionist Party
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Date lodged: Tuesday, 21 April 2020
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Current Status:
Answered by Jeane Freeman on 20 May 2020
To ask the Scottish Government which NHS (a) wards, (b) respiratory wards and admission units (c) other facilities are not providing staff with full personal protective equipment (PPE) and for what reasons.
Answer
That information is not held centrally. Between 1 March 2020 and 27 April, over 97 million items of PPE have been distributed to NHS Boards.
Each board now has a single point of contact for supply and importantly distribution of appropriate PPE to each clinical setting in hospital and to ensure any issues are speedily addressed.
- Asked by: Miles Briggs, MSP for Lothian, Scottish Conservative and Unionist Party
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Date lodged: Tuesday, 21 April 2020
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Current Status:
Answered by Jeane Freeman on 20 May 2020
To ask the Scottish Government how many staff are trained to care for a patient on a ventilator in each NHS board.
Answer
All Health Boards have produced mobilisation plans which set out the steps they are taking to maximise intensive care capacity while maintaining essential services, such as emergency, cancer and maternity care. All Health Boards have now implemented plans to increase ICU capacity to treble their baseline. This increase in ICU bed capacity includes increased staffing delivered through internal redeployment supported by education and training which is being locally provided to meet the needs of each Board. The Chief Nursing Officer issued guidance to all Health Boards to support the deployment of Nursing, AHP, Pharmacy and other staff in Critical Care last month.
- Asked by: Miles Briggs, MSP for Lothian, Scottish Conservative and Unionist Party
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Date lodged: Tuesday, 21 April 2020
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Current Status:
Answered by Jeane Freeman on 20 May 2020
To ask the Scottish Government how many people have received cancer treatment in each week since 1 January 2020.
Answer
Information on the number of people who have received cancer treatment in each week since 1 January 2020 is not available yet from Public Health Scotland. Quarterly Information on the number of referrals who started first treatment up to the end of 2019 is available for the ten main cancer sites from the Cancer Waiting Times dataset. The ten main cancer sites are: breast, cervical, colorectal, head & neck, lung, lymphoma, ovarian, melanoma, upper gastro-intestinal (hepato-pancreato-biliary and oesophago-gastric), and urological (prostate, bladder, other). Quarterly information up to end of March 2020 will be available from 30 June 2020 .
- Asked by: Miles Briggs, MSP for Lothian, Scottish Conservative and Unionist Party
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Date lodged: Wednesday, 01 April 2020
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Current Status:
Answered by Jeane Freeman on 20 May 2020
To ask the Scottish Government what steps it has taken to ensure that COVID-19 guidance is underpinned by appropriate psychological knowledge, and how it ensures that its decisions on such matters are clearly communicated to the public.
Answer
Guidance is based on reviewing the available published evidence and informed by expert opinion drawn from a wide range of sources, including from behavioural sciences. Guidance and advice for the public is available through NHS Inform, a substantive media campaign is underway to raise awareness of these resources.
- Asked by: Miles Briggs, MSP for Lothian, Scottish Conservative and Unionist Party
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Date lodged: Wednesday, 15 April 2020
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Current Status:
Answered by Jeane Freeman on 19 May 2020
To ask the Scottish Government what correspondence the Cabinet Secretary for Health and Sport has had with representatives of independent care homes since the COVID-19 outbreak began.
Answer
The Scottish Government is in regular written and phone contact with Scottish Care, who are the representative body of most care home providers in Scotland, on a range of matters relating to Covid-19 and I regularly speak to their CEO, Dr Donald Macaskill.
- Asked by: Miles Briggs, MSP for Lothian, Scottish Conservative and Unionist Party
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Date lodged: Tuesday, 14 April 2020
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Current Status:
Answered by Jeane Freeman on 19 May 2020
To ask the Scottish Government, in light of the COVID-19 outbreak, whether it will reconsider the closure of any NHS laundry facilities.
Answer
The Scottish Government has made no decision on NHS laundry services and will not make a decision until we have addressed the current Covid-19 situation.
- Asked by: Miles Briggs, MSP for Lothian, Scottish Conservative and Unionist Party
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Date lodged: Tuesday, 21 April 2020
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Current Status:
Answered by Jeane Freeman on 19 May 2020
To ask the Scottish Government what plans it has to train COVID-19 contact tracers.
Answer
The Scottish Government set out our approach to contact tracing on 4 May in the Test, Trace Isolate, Support Strategy . We will establish an enhanced COVID-19 contact tracing service in every Board. Recruitment and training of new staff will be managed by existing health protection teams who have high quality skills and experience in delivering contact tracing, and of which some are already undertaking COVID-19 contact tracing work. Recruitment has commenced in a phased approach, to introduce as necessary a national contract tracing team managing routine work and supporting local contact tracing teams. Initial workforce education resources for staff supporting the contact tracing programme have been developed in partnership with Health Boards and made available to all Health Boards before 25th May. All staff who will be recruited to undertaken Contact Tracing activity either at a national level or local level, will use these core materials to help ensure consistency across Health Boards in Scotland. As of 18 May 2020, c 680 staff have been identified locally and over 8000 notes of interest have been received nationally, in addition to those NHS returners who are being considered for deployment.