Chamber and committees

In the over-70s group, 95 per cent have had boosters—

I will look at those figures specifically, but we must have the context that there is a very high level of vaccination among the over-70s. We take a range of steps, such as the prioritisation of care homes for the delivery of the vaccination programme. At the outset, there was a bit of criticism of the Scottish Government that we were not moving as fast as England, but we were doing the painstaking work of making sure that people in our care homes were well vaccinated, and that level has been very high.

Equally, we have to ensure that people who are housebound are vaccinated. I have dealt with a number of cases in my constituency where vaccinations of people who are housebound were undertaken more slowly than people would have liked, but my recent case load indicates that that position is substantially enhanced. I agree with Mr Rowley on the importance of vaccination, but we have to keep a sense of perspective, because we have very high levels of vaccination in those age groups.

Does Niamh O’Connor or Professor Leitch want to add anything to what I have said?

It is a very careful judgment that has to be made, and Mr Mason puts a fair and challenging point to me. The situation that we must consider involves a balance of considerations around a number of factors, such as the prevalence of the virus, the presence of hospital cases, the pressures on intensive care and a variety of other social and economic indicators, not least the wider wellbeing of the population, the ability to sustain restrictions and the impact that those might have on the mental and economic wellbeing of individuals.

There is a careful balance to be struck, and I hope that Mr Mason accepts from the explanation that the First Minister gave on Tuesday and that I have given today that, while we are hopeful, the Government continues to take a cautious course in the relaxation of restrictions.

We are taking a phased approach. In the course of the week, I have dealt with a range of broadcast media and handled criticism that the Government did not go further in the relaxation of measures than we did on Tuesday. A number of sectors have strongly expressed those criticisms. In essence, Mr Mason puts to me the counterpoint and asks why we are going as fast as we are going. It is a not unreasonable point.

We judge that enabling some of the larger events—such as those in outdoor football stadiums, where vaccination certification and lateral flow device testing are required among at least 50 per cent of the crowd—to take their course is a reasonable first step in the relaxation of restrictions while we consider whether, with the benefit of another week of data, we can see a wider improvement in the situation that allows us to relax measures further. I acknowledge that it is a careful balance, and it is one with which the Government wrestles with a great deal of consideration.

Again, it is the balance question. In a moment, I will invite Professor Leitch to give some detail on the clinical justification for the change, because we need to hear that. Ministers have heard it and come to conclusions about it.

There is an important perspective that has to be borne in mind. It goes back to many of the questions that we have wrestled with as ministers and shared with the committee on a number of occasions about the four harms framework. Multiple harms are created as a consequence of Covid. Loss of economic wellbeing is one of them. Loss of social interaction is another. Ministers have to be conscious of those factors when we take decisions on matters such as self-isolation.

We have been criticised for taking too long to relax the self-isolation rules, but we took an appropriate amount of time to make the judgments within the context of the arrangements for, and the policy approach that we have taken to, managing the pandemic. That will be an important point in relation to the judgments that we will have to apply in the future.

I invite Professor Leitch to add some remarks on the clinical explanation for the relaxation of the self-isolation requirements.

I agree with that.

I will say a few words before I turn to Professor Leitch.

It is critical that our healthcare system is able to meet the needs of all individuals, regardless of the health condition that they face, recognising the necessity of interventions where they are appropriate. That is one of the reasons why we have to manage and suppress the prevalence of Covid—the more Covid cases there are in our hospitals, the less space there is for other conditions to be addressed. That is the central argument that ministers have set out to the committee, the Parliament and the public on the steps that we have taken to tackle Covid. We have taken appropriate and proportionate action in order to enable our health service to timeously meet the needs of all constituents, such as the person Mr Whittle mentioned, while also dealing with the pressures that come from Covid.

Those are fundamental questions about the capacity of the health service, on which I invite Professor Leitch to give some more detail.

Those messages are communicated by Government. Our clinical advisers have been at the forefront of arguing for the rationale for vaccination and the booster programme, and ministers likewise. At the heart of many of the interventions that we have made—whether on public communication or policy interventions such as vaccine certification—the purpose has been to increase the level of vaccination in the population because it is a compelling protection against the virus. I can assure Mr Fraser that those messages have been and will be communicated by ministers.

Some of the endless speculation about these matters sometimes muddies the waters. It has been crystal clear for a long time now that vaccination is critical as an obstacle to circulation and to protect people against the virus. When we go through all the issues about extra bits of data, it almost leaves the public thinking that there is something that they or the Government are missing about the data, whereas it is actually crystal clear: if you get vaccinated, you have more protection against Covid.

Mr Whittle raises legitimate points, which come back to points that I made in my previous answer. We must ensure that the needs of the population are met by the national health service. It is the fundamental founding commitment of the NHS that free treatment be provided at the point of need when individuals experience that need. Covid poses a threat to that, because it takes up capacity in our hospitals. More than 1,500 patients are in hospital with Covid. If Covid was not a problem for us, those 1,500 beds could be used for other purposes.

Therefore, the more we can get on top of Covid and reduce the circulation of the virus, the better, because that creates space for patients, such as the people on whose behalf Mr Whittle argues today and, for that matter, has argued consistently for some considerable time.

The Government has tried to take all the necessary steps to sustain the engagement of critical services for people with conditions that have a life-threatening impact. Along with clinicians and health services, we have worked hard to sustain cancer services. Obviously, for acute presentations of life-threatening conditions, the health service is there to meet people’s needs. That is why we look very carefully at the numbers of people who are in ICU with Covid, because we need space in ICU for people who come in because of heart attacks, brain haemorrhages or whatever it happens to be.

Mr Whittle is right to raise those issues, and I assure him and the public that the Government, in its management of Covid, has the patient group that Mr Whittle raises very much in our minds. We want to ensure that their interests are protected.

Good morning, convener. I am grateful to the committee for the opportunity to discuss a number of matters, including updates to Parliament on Covid-19, and to make some opening remarks before taking questions.

As the First Minister set out on Tuesday, although omicron is continuing to cause extremely high levels of new cases and we must remain careful, there are grounds for cautious optimism that our current additional measures and the efforts that are being made by people across Scotland are having an impact. Last month, our central projection was that new infections could reach 50,000 a day by early January. So far, that has not materialised, and we estimate that the total number of daily infections may be around 30,000. We are also seeing that the numbers of cases confirmed by a polymerase chain reaction test have fallen in all age groups, except the over-85s. That is encouraging, and it gives us some hope that cases might be at or close to the peak. Further, although the number of people in hospital with Covid has continued to increase over the past week, there are signs that the rate of increase may be starting to slow.

In line with our guidance that was set out last week, people without symptoms who test positive with a lateral flow test no longer need to secure a confirmatory PCR test. That means that the current daily numbers are capturing fewer positive cases than before. To address that, Public Health Scotland will, from today, augment its daily reports to include the combined figure for the number of people who have recorded a first positive PCR or lateral flow test. That additional data will allow us to assess the trend in cases more accurately. I encourage members of the public to continue to record their lateral flow results, whether they are positive or negative. That can be done very easily through the United Kingdom Government website, by searching for “report a lateral flow test”.

Although we must remain careful and cautious, the Cabinet agreed on Tuesday to begin lifting the additional protective measures that were introduced before Christmas. We will do so in a phased manner, and further dates will be announced in due course. From Monday 17 January, the attendance limits on large-scale outdoor events will be removed. Certification will remain in place for events and venues that were previously covered by the scheme, and we are asking event organisers to check the certification status of more people attending events. From Monday, for the purposes of certification, the requirement to be fully vaccinated will include having a booster if the second dose was more than four months ago.

For the time being, baseline measures that were in place before the emergence of omicron, such as wearing face coverings in indoor places and working from home where possible, will remain in place. For the immediate period ahead, our advice remains that people should limit their contact with other households and, in particular, not meet indoors with more than three households. We are not asking people to cut all social interaction, but reducing contacts and prioritising who we meet will help to reduce the risk. Our advice remains to take a lateral flow test and report the result when meeting others.

Finally, the First Minister confirmed that the Scottish Government intends to publish a revised strategic framework in the next few weeks. I will update the committee further once that has been published.

I am happy to answer any questions that the committee may have.

Obviously, we will carefully monitor the impact of schools returning. That is central to the approach that the Government is taking, because we recognise that their return marks a gathering of individuals within our society at a fairly high level. As we know, the meeting of individuals from multiple households leads to the spread of the Covid virus.

We will monitor the situation closely. That is why we are taking a phased approach to the relaxation of restrictions. Although the current data is encouraging, the data could be influenced by the effect of schools returning, and we will now only just be beginning to see the effects of that in the numbers, to the extent that that will have an effect.

We do not have authorisation from the Joint Committee on Vaccination and Immunisation for the widespread vaccination of children who are in the five-to-12 age group. The JCVI has not made the case for that and, as the committee will know, we look to and implement the advice of the JCVI. The JCVI has indicated that it is appropriate to vaccinate some children in that group, particularly if the child might be clinically vulnerable or living in a household with individuals who are clinically vulnerable. We are taking steps to implement those recommendations, as has been confirmed in Parliament.

On the final part of your question, ventilation is ostensibly a local authority priority. We have been engaging with local authorities on ventilation over the past 20 months, and we have required them to enhance the monitoring of air quality in schools to ensure that we have a good understanding of where some of the ventilation requirements might need to be in place. On Tuesday, the First Minister announced further expansion of the funding available to local authorities to enhance ventilation schemes, should that be required. Local authorities have undertaken extensive audits of ventilation requirements on a classroom-by-classroom basis, and we expect them to act accordingly to address any ventilation weaknesses that emerge out of those surveys.