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Nicola Sturgeon has denied the number of Covid-19 deaths in Scottish care homes is double the rate of elsewhere in the UK.
The First Minister was grilled by opposition leaders at FMQs today on reports Scotland was “lagging behind” when it came to testing staff and residents.
Scottish Conservative leader Jackson Carlaw claimed the Scottish approach to testing for coronavirus in care homes was an “abject failure”.
I have raised the case of a home in Uddingston where 22 residents are suspected to have died from the virus.
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The Tory MSP said an advanced outbreak investigation did not happen at the Highgate institution, and claimed Scotland was falling behind other parts of the UK in using its testing capacity.
“Fixing testing must become this government’s overriding focus and it is clear it hasn’t been,” Carlaw said.
I’ve asked the SNP leader if she agreed that “by any standards this is a failure”.
But the First Minister responded she was not sure the numbers of care home deaths in other UK areas were being reported properly – citing a new academic report that suggested the “real care home death toll is double” in England, while stressing it was “not a competition. “
Official figures published today revealed there were 3,213 deaths registered in Scotland as of May 10 which involved Covid-19 – 45 per cent of which were in care homes.
In comparison, figures for England and Wales suggests around a quarter of Covid-19 deaths were in such facilities.
The First Minister continued: “I’m really not interested in political comparisons or anything. It is just not relevant.
“But I do want to challenge this – that the death toll in care homes is ‘double’ in Scotland what it is elsewhere in the UK. I do not believe that is the case.
“I would point again to the study that has been published this morning that suggests the disparity is down to under-reporting in the rest of the UK and Scotland’s figures, which I think are more in line with international examples, are accurate.”
Scottish Labor leader Richard Leonard said: “Every day and every night care home staff are going to work in fear that they are passing on the virus to their residents, people who they care for deeply.
“The anxiety and guilt that they feel is a burden which they should not have to carry. Now more than ever they need our support. ”
Meanwhile, Scottish Greens co-leader Alison Johnstone raised the results of new research into testing at Cambridge hospital, which found a significant number of staff had COVID-19 without displaying any symptoms.
“It’s beyond the doubt that regular testing is needed both to protect frontline staff and to get control of this virus,” she said.
“A growing list of experts and organizations have backed my proposals for this to happen, so it is difficult to see why the Scottish Government hasn’t made this a priority.”
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