Chamber and committees

That is great—I appreciate that the situation is quite unique in Shetland. Dr Gilmore, should we be thinking of radically changing the dental system to something more like the GP system—where the GPs work for the public sector almost 100 per cent—and drop the private side?

Can I ask you for a quick response, Ms McElrath—would you agree with Dr Gilmore?

There has been a lot of doom and gloom, rightly, around the pandemic and all that has happened. Has anything good come out of the pandemic by way of lessons that we can learn for the future?

Thanks. I might come back to you on that point afterwards.

Mr Visocchi, Shetland is a bit smaller, so I guess that you are all friends with each other. Did you gain anything positive from the pandemic?

Okay. I understand that. Looking forward, do you have views on whether we should tidy up the present system or do something more major than that?

Do you have views on the financial arrangements, or is that not within your scope?

Dr Eshelli talked about needing more information about the current system. Do we need to do that or should we change the system?

I take your point that the financial side is not your primary area of expertise, but it obviously has an impact. From some of the information that we have been given, it sounds as though NHS dentistry is dying and private dentistry is growing. If we ended up with only private dentistry, would there be any preventative work?

That takes me on to what we can do about that. Actually, before I ask about that, I have another question. Can we therefore assume that, in quite a lot of the population, including me, dental health is deteriorating, and will perhaps continue to deteriorate over the next few years until that 70 per cent figure goes up again?

Okay—can I ask Ms McElrath that question as well?