- Asked by: Jackie Baillie, MSP for Dumbarton, Scottish Labour
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Date lodged: Thursday, 03 June 2021
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Current Status:
Answered by Humza Yousaf on 22 June 2021
To ask the Scottish Government how much it has spent on prescriptions in each of the last five years, and how many people received a prescription.
Answer
The cost of medicines and appliances in the past five financial years, 2016-17 to 2020-21, is shown in Table 1. These data relate to community dispensing only.
Table 1 – Gross Ingredient Cost (£), 2016/17 – 2020/21 Year | Gross Ingredient Cost (GIC) (£) |
2016-17 | 1,137,588,236 |
2017-18 | 1,170,761,719 |
2018-19 | 1,142,104,457 |
2019-20 | 1,175,878,909 |
2020-21 | 1,118,110,484 |
Source: Public Health Scotland, PIS (Prescribing Data)
Reference: IR2021-00410
The number of people who have received a prescription in the last five years has recently been provided in an answer to S5W-36221 on 30 April 2021. This presented the number of patients with a paid prescription by financial year from financial year 2009-2010 to financial year 2020-2021 (partial year to December 2020 data).
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
- Asked by: Claire Baker, MSP for Mid Scotland and Fife, Scottish Labour
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Date lodged: Thursday, 03 June 2021
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Current Status:
Answered by Humza Yousaf on 22 June 2021
To ask the Scottish Government whether there has been in increase in cases of children being hospitalised as a result of COVID-19 in the six months up to June 2021.
Answer
This data is available on the Public Health Scotland Education Surveillance Dashboard which provides a three-weekly rolling average of hospital admissions for 2-17 years olds - COVID-19 Education Surveillance dashboard - Enhanced surveillance of COVID-19 in education settings - COVID-19 data and intelligence - COVID-19 - Our areas of work - Public Health Scotland
Equivalent weekly data for children under 2 years is not currently published however, data on Cumulative COVID-19 Hospital Admissions since the start of the pandemic is available and shows that as of 26 May 2021, 238 children between 0-4 years have been admitted to hospital with COVID-19 since March 2020. The full set of data can be found here - https://www.opendata.nhs.scot/dataset/weekly-covid-19-statistical-data-in-scotland/resource/bd8a865f-10e6-47d2-a461-8633c61693fe .
- Asked by: Jackie Baillie, MSP for Dumbarton, Scottish Labour
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Date lodged: Thursday, 03 June 2021
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Current Status:
Answered by Humza Yousaf on 22 June 2021
To ask the Scottish Government how many young people aged (a) under 12, (b) 12 to 15 and (c) 16 to 17 have been in hospital with COVID-19 each week in 2021.
Answer
This data is available on the Public Health Scotland Education Surveillance Dashboard which provides a three-weekly rolling average of hospital admissions for 2-17 years olds - COVID-19 Education Surveillance dashboard - Enhanced surveillance of COVID-19 in education settings - COVID-19 data and intelligence - COVID-19 - Our areas of work - Public Health Scotland
Equivalent weekly data for children under 2 years is not currently published however, data on Cumulative COVID-19 Hospital Admissions since the start of the pandemic is available and shows that as of 26 May 2021, 238 children between 0-4 years have been admitted to hospital with COVID-19 since March 2020. The full set of data can be found here - https://www.opendata.nhs.scot/dataset/weekly-covid-19-statistical-data-in-scotland/resource/bd8a865f-10e6-47d2-a461-8633c61693fe .
- Asked by: Sharon Dowey, MSP for South Scotland, Scottish Conservative and Unionist Party
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Date lodged: Thursday, 17 June 2021
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Current Status:
Answered by Shirley-Anne Somerville on 22 June 2021
To ask the Scottish Government how much funding it has allocated in (a) the South Scotland parliamentary region and (b) each local authority area for the purchase of scientific equipment for schools in each year since 2012-13.
Answer
Scientific equipment for use in lessons is purchased by schools and the amount schools spend on scientific equipment is not decided centrally by the Scottish Government.
Scottish Government's policy towards local authorities' spending is to allow local authorities the financial freedom to operate independently. As such, the vast majority of the revenue funding is provided by means of a block grant. It is the responsibility of individual local authorities to manage their own budgets and to allocate the total financial resources available to them, including on Education, on the basis of local needs and priorities, having first fulfilled their statutory obligations and the jointly agreed set of national and local priorities.
- Asked by: Claire Baker, MSP for Mid Scotland and Fife, Scottish Labour
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Date lodged: Thursday, 03 June 2021
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Current Status:
Answered by Humza Yousaf on 22 June 2021
To ask the Scottish Government whether its assessment of the risk to children’s health from COVID-19 is being revised, and on what basis.
Answer
Preliminary data indicates that in the Delta wave we are seeing a cohort of younger adults in hospital with Covid.
We do not recommend travelling to another area of Scotland to take part in an activity that is not permitted in your local protection level.
The risk of COVID-19 to young children remains low.
- Asked by: Graham Simpson, MSP for Central Scotland, Scottish Conservative and Unionist Party
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Date lodged: Tuesday, 15 June 2021
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Current Status:
Answered by Kate Forbes on 22 June 2021
To ask the Scottish Government how much financial support it has provided to taxi drivers since the start of the COVID-19 pandemic.
Answer
As at 30 April the Scottish Government has paid £32,725,500 to more than 21,800 taxi drivers through the Taxi and Private Hire Driver Support Fund. The Scottish Government recognised the continued financial challenges facing the sector and therefore taxi drivers who previously received a grant from the Taxi and Private Hire Driver Support Fund earlier in 2021 received a further grant of £1,500 taking support to a total of £3,000. We have allocated a further £62 million for taxi drivers and operators, bringing the total support for the taxi sector during the pandemic to more than £90 million.
The Scottish Government publishes statistics and management information relating to its Covid-19 business grants on its website at Coronavirus (COVID-19): business support funding statistics - gov.scot (www.gov.scot)
The next update is scheduled to be published on 7 July 2021.
- Asked by: Monica Lennon, MSP for Central Scotland, Scottish Labour
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Date lodged: Monday, 07 June 2021
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Current Status:
Answered by Mairi McAllan on 22 June 2021
To ask the Scottish Government what its response is to calls from the Scottish Environment Link coalition to introduce legally-binding targets to protect wildlife by 2022.
Answer
The Scottish Government is committed to action to protect wildlife and to the effective monitoring of progress towards this goal. The Scottish Government has recently added a new single high level indicator to the National Performance Framework which measures trends in marine and terrestrial biodiversity in Scotland.
We have committed to introducing an ambitious new Biodiversity Strategy for Scotland within a year of the UN Convention on Biological Diversity Conference of the Parties (CoP15) and the publication of a new global biodiversity framework. Policies to take forward our commitment to tackle the nature crisis and methods to measure progress in this regard will be considered as part of the development of this Strategy and its supporting delivery plan.
- Asked by: Jackie Baillie, MSP for Dumbarton, Scottish Labour
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Date lodged: Tuesday, 01 June 2021
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Current Status:
Answered by Humza Yousaf on 22 June 2021
To ask the Scottish Government how many radiotherapy training places have there been in each academic year, since 2015.
Answer
Radiography education is not commissioned or controlled by the Scottish Government. The following table sets out the number of entrants to accredited radiography courses at Scottish Universities each academic year. The courses included match the Health and Care Professions Council’s (HCPC) list of accredited courses from 2015-16.
Entrants to accredited pre-registration radiography courses.
Year | 2015-16 | 2016-17 | 2017-18 | 2018-19 | 2019-20 |
Therapeutic Radiography | 54 | 71 | 47 | 47 | 43 |
Diagnostic Radiography | 119 | 146 | 140 | 152 | 155 |
Total | 173 | 217 | 187 | 199 | 198 |
Source: HESA Student Population
Clinical Radiology
The following table gives the overall established number of Clinical Radiology trainee posts in place in each year from 2015 to 2021:
Clinical Radiology Programme Establishment |
2015 | 2016 | 2017 | 2018 | 2019 | 2020 | 2021 |
121 | 129 | 139 | 149 | 160 | 172 | 182 |
The above table includes Scottish Government funding for 18 additional posts between 2015 and 2017 with a further commitment of another 50 funded posts, 10 per year from 2018.
Source: NHS Education for Scotland (NES) medical trainee establishment data
- Asked by: Rachael Hamilton, MSP for Ettrick, Roxburgh and Berwickshire, Scottish Conservative and Unionist Party
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Date lodged: Monday, 21 June 2021
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Current Status:
Taken in the Chamber on 24 June 2021
To ask the First Minister what action the Scottish Government is taking to curb the decline of iconic woodland bird species in Scotland.
Answer
Taken in the Chamber on 24 June 2021
- Asked by: Anas Sarwar, MSP for Glasgow, Scottish Labour
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Date lodged: Monday, 21 June 2021
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Current Status:
Taken in the Chamber on 24 June 2021
Question to be taken in Chamber.
Answer
Taken in the Chamber on 24 June 2021
