Thanks to Dottie once more for alerting me to this. This Sky News special on maternity services, ‘in this country’, is of course about England. They go on quickly to relate their special to the report by Baroness Amos and remind us that it made ‘pretty horrific reading.’ I watched no further. Why? Baroness Amos looked only at England. Is the Sky News special likely to be informative on Scotland? No, because: Thousands of babies and mothers avoidably dead in maternity trusts, twelve trusts under investigation and two trusts face police investigations into potential corporate manslaughter and gross negligence manslaughter … Continue reading Sky News reports on maternity ‘horror stories in this country’ but it’s not THIS country

On the front page of the Sunday Post, the above, aimed at its elderly audience to provoke another ‘That SNP!’ reaction, days before an election is from Geriatrician, Professor Andrew Elder (sic) of the Royal College of Physicians of Edinburgh. You see those ‘reports’? Indeed, no figures, no sources. These ‘reports‘ are associations, not direct proof of causation. The “excess deaths” method from the Royal College is a modelled estimate, not a count of individually verified deaths caused by delays. Patients waiting long times are often already very ill, which complicates attribution. Sicker patients both wait longer (due to needing … Continue reading There is no reliable evidence that patients die in A&E units ‘due’ to care shortages in Scotland only this Prof’s anecdotes again

The Herald today has: Scotland already has far more, per head of population, GPs, nurses, midwives and other professionals than other parts of the UK (table above, sources below) so Prof Cameron’s theory seems a little thin, simplistic. Here’s another explanation but one of course which cannot be laid at the door of the SNP Government’s limited devolved powers. The major rise in processed/UPF availability and reliance began decades earlier (1980s–2000s), becoming entrenched by the 2010s. This long-term poor diet quality (cumulative effects on obesity, inflammation, mental health, and chronic conditions) helps explain why health gains from medical advances stalled … Continue reading The causes of healthy life expectancy falling – Scotland already has far more, per head of population, GPs, nurses, midwives and other professionals than other parts of the UK so maybe look at this?

Headlining on BBC Breakfast this morning, this claim from Health Watch UK: NHS Scotland is not part of the study: In 2023, 9% of those we polled had accessed private healthcare in the last year. By 2025, this figure nearly doubled to 16%. The use of private dental care increased from 22% to 32% over the same period. The poll of 2,593 people in England, aged 18 and above, was run by Savanta between 31 October and 7 November 2025. We asked about the public’s use of NHS and private health care, and their confidence in accessing timely NHS care. https://www.healthwatch.co.uk/news/2026-03-16/two-tier-healthcare-increases-confidence-timely-access-remains-low … Continue reading As healthcare in England becomes a full-blown two-tier system with only 84% now in the NHS how health care in Scotland remains 96% within the NHS