Scottish Labour only really has drug deaths to use for comparisons with other parts of the UK.

Health is a minefield for them so they carefully tip-toe around the facts.

We’re not going to let them do that, are we? No.

The facts you might need, to consider the chances of recovery:

First, staffing:

NHS Scotland has 181 000 staff, 1 for every 30 members of the population of 5.44 million.

NHS England has 1.4 million staff, 1 for every 40 members of the population of 56 million.

NHS Wales has 90 000 million staff, 1 for every 35 members of the population of 3.14 million.

Sources:

https://turasdata.nes.nhs.scot/media/rgyfigzk/workforce-report-june-2022.html#:~:text=On%2031%20March%202022%2C%20NHS,156%2C875.6%20WTE%20(Figure%203.1).

https://www.kingsfund.org.uk/projects/nhs-in-a-nutshell/nhs-workforce#:~:text=and%20staff%20wellbeing.-,Workforce%20by%20staff%20group,time%20equivalent%20(FTE)%20basis.

https://heiw.nhs.wales/careers/working-in-nhs-wales/#:~:text=The%20NHS%20is%20the%20largest%20employer%20in%20Wales%20with%20over%2090%2C000%20staff.

Almost without exception, across Scotland, there are far more GPs per head of population and especially so in BMA Scotland’s ‘crisis-ridden’ rural parts. Look at rural Wales:

Second, waiting times:

Reading today Sunak ‘highly unlikely’ to meet promise to cut NHS waiting lists, warn health leaders and predictions that England’s waiting list will soar to 8 million next year, from the 7.6 million in the above graphs, I had a wee look around and found that in an August 2023 Guardian article I’d missed and ‘our’ media had ignored.

In that report we see also:

“There are many differences across the devolved nations which might be relevant here, notably an older population in Scotland and Wales with more deprivation; higher nurse staffing and higher spending in both Scotland and Wales; and more doctors in Scotland,” they [Nuffield Trust] said.

So, against the odds, with an older more deprived population, NHS Scotland still performs best.

Finally, for when Jackie Baillie accuses the Scottish Government of not spending as much on the NHS, this:

Health expenditure in the United Kingdom in 2021/22 (of which NHS spend is the lion’s share) was highest in Scotland at £3,490 per person and lowest in England at £3,192 per capita.

And, remember this:

NHS bosses are using misleading figures to hide dangerously poor performance by A&E units in England against the four-hour treatment target, emergency department doctors claim.

Some A&Es treat and admit, transfer or discharge as few as one in three patients within four hours, although the NHS constitution says they should deal with 95% of arrivals within that timeframe. How well or poorly A&Es are doing in meeting the 95% target is not in the public domain because the data that NHS England publishes is for NHS trusts overall, not individual hospitals.

That means official figures are an aggregate of performance at sometimes two A&Es run by the same trust or include data for any walk-in centres, minor injuries units or urgent treatment centres that a trust also operates. Forty-eight trusts have two A&Es and many also run at least one of the latter.https://www.theguardian.com/society/2023/oct/28/misleading-ae-figures-in-england-hiding-poor-performance

So, just how much faster are Scotland’s full A&E departments, then? Might that 13.8% be 30% or 50%? It’d take more IQ and time than I have to answer that but, once more, NHS England, saturated in dishonest managerialism, is revealed to be cheating.

Previously, we’ve seen them restarting the clocks well after A&E admissions, not counting hospital-acquired Covid infections at all, chucking millions at private hospitals to reduce the non-life-threatening longer waits just for press releases and planning to reduce the range of cancer targets.

Yet, BBC Scotland and the others will still let Jackie Baillie shout unquestioned, lies at the Scottish Government.