Chamber and committees

Questions and answers

Parliamentary questions can be asked by any MSP to the Scottish Government or the Scottish Parliamentary Corporate Body. The questions provide a means for MSPs to get factual and statistical information.

Written questions must be answered within 10 working days (20 working days during recess)
Other questions such as Topical, Portfolio, General and First Minister's Question Times are taken in the Chamber

Urgent Questions aren't included in the Question and Answers search. There is a SPICe fact sheet listing Urgent and emergency questions.

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Question reference: S5W-22627

Asked by: Miles Briggs, MSP for Lothian, Scottish Conservative and Unionist Party
Date lodged: Friday, 12 April 2019
Current Status: Answered by Joe FitzPatrick on 2 May 2019

To ask the Scottish Government whether it will publish data showing how many obese people there have been in (a) Scotland and (b) each NHS board area in each of the last five calendar years, broken down by (i) age and (ii) gender.

The Scottish Health Survey provides a breakdown of the prevalence of obesity at Scotland level for adults and children by age and gender.

Adult obesity by gender in each of the last five calendar years is available here:

https://www.gov.scot/publications/scottish-health-survey-2017-volume-1-main-report/pages/98/

Adults obesity by age is available in the reports for each year. The 2017 breakdown is available here https://www.gov.scot/publications/scottish-health-Children time sersurvey-2017-volume-1-main-report/pages/99/

Child obesity by gender for each year is available here:

https://www.gov.scot/publications/scottish-health-survey-2017-volume-1-main-report/pages/100/

Child obesity by age is available in the reports for each year. The 2017 breakdown is available here:

https://www.gov.scot/publications/scottish-health-survey-2017-volume-1-main-report/pages/101/

The Scottish Health Survey also provides prevalence of obesity for adults by gender for each NHS Board, using four years of data combined:

https://www.gov.scot/publications/scottish-health-survey-results-local-areas-2014-2015-2016-2017/pages/3/

The sample size of the Scottish Health Survey is not sufficient to provide a breakdown of child obesity by NHS Board.

Data showing the proportion of children in P1 (aged 4 ½ - 6 ¼) at risk of obesity in each NHS board area, in each of the last five calendar years, is available in the Body Mass Index of Primary 1 Children in Scotland dashboard. This is broken down by gender in the ‘how does BMI vary by sex?’ tab:

https://www.isdscotland.org/Health-Topics/Child-Health/Publications/2018-12-11/visualisation.asp

Question reference: S5W-22630

Asked by: Miles Briggs, MSP for Lothian, Scottish Conservative and Unionist Party
Date lodged: Friday, 12 April 2019
Current Status: Answered by Joe FitzPatrick on 2 May 2019

To ask the Scottish Government what plans it has to introduce and implement a national obesity strategy for adults and children, and what discussions (a) ministers and (b) its officials have had on the issue since January 2014.

Question reference: S5W-22628

Asked by: Miles Briggs, MSP for Lothian, Scottish Conservative and Unionist Party
Date lodged: Friday, 12 April 2019
Current Status: Answered by Joe FitzPatrick on 2 May 2019

To ask the Scottish Government what steps it is taking to reduce disparities in levels of (a) adult and (b) childhood obesity on the basis of deprivation.

The Scottish Government wants everyone in Scotland, no matter where they live, to eat well and have a healthy weight. That is why reducing diet-related health inequalities is a primary objective of our Diet and Healthy Weight Delivery Plan.

This will be achieved through a broad range of action focussed on prevention and early intervention. This includes population level interventions, such as restricting the promotion of junk food, which will support everyone in Scotland to make healthier choices, and through targeted and tailored support specifically to those individuals, children and families who need it most.

We must also tackle root causes of poverty and inequality. Since they are symptomatic of wider social inequalities, we are taking decisive action on a number of fronts. That includes action to end poverty, support fair wages, help families, and improve our physical and social environments. We also invested over £125m in 2018-19 on welfare mitigation and measures to protect those on low incomes in the face of UK Government’s cuts. And we are establishing Public Health Scotland which will take a leading role in tackling health inequalities.

Question reference: S5W-22509

Asked by: Miles Briggs, MSP for Lothian, Scottish Conservative and Unionist Party
Date lodged: Wednesday, 03 April 2019
Current Status: Answered by Maree Todd on 1 May 2019

To ask the Scottish Government (a) how many and (b) what percentage of newborns have received a baby box each year.

Scotland’s Baby Boxes began distribution on 15 August 2017.

In the first full year (15 August 2017 to 15 August 2018) we distributed 52,065 Baby Boxes.

The total distributed up to 5 April 2019 is 83,199 Baby Boxes.

In terms of uptake rates, this is difficult to calculate as APS (the Baby Box Delivery Agent) only collects data on expected due date (since the boxes are delivered 4-6 weeks prior to the due date) but not the actual birth dates. The following table shows Baby Box registrations with babies due within each quarter compared to NRS recorded birth figures within each quarter. In the absence of actual date of birth, we consider due date registration data to provide the best figures to use to analyse take up. It can however only provide an indication of take up and should be treated as an indicative figure only.

NRS Birth records by Quarter	Dates	Births	Registrations with Babies Due within quarter	Take up – Babies due as a % of Scottish births
Quarter 3 2018	1 July – 30 September	13,077	12493	96%
Quarter 2 2018	1 April – 30 June	12,973	12006	93%
Quarter 1 2018	1 January – 31 March	12,713	11417	90%
Quarter 4 2017	1 October – 31 December	12,821	11730	91%
Quarter 3 2017	1 July – 30 September	13,847	6171 *	-

Please note the figure for Quarter 3 2017 includes priority due dates 01-01-2017 (65 babies) and 15-08-2018 (171 babies) where due dates may have been prior to 01-07-2017.

Question reference: S5W-22607

Asked by: Miles Briggs, MSP for Lothian, Scottish Conservative and Unionist Party
Date lodged: Wednesday, 10 April 2019
Current Status: Answered by Jeane Freeman on 1 May 2019

To ask the Scottish Government what plans it has to publish details regarding the process for agreeing commercial and data collection arrangements for medicines that are subject to the new ultra-orphan pathway.

Question reference: S5W-22548

Asked by: Miles Briggs, MSP for Lothian, Scottish Conservative and Unionist Party
Date lodged: Thursday, 04 April 2019
Current Status: Answered by Jeane Freeman on 1 May 2019

To ask the Scottish Government what framework will be used following the interim funding period to assess medicines subject to the new ultra-orphan pathway.

Question reference: S5W-22549

Asked by: Miles Briggs, MSP for Lothian, Scottish Conservative and Unionist Party
Date lodged: Thursday, 04 April 2019
Current Status: Answered by Jeane Freeman on 1 May 2019

To ask the Scottish Government how real world evidence will be used following the interim funding period as part of the assessment of medicines subject to the new ultra-orphan pathway.

Question reference: S5W-22547

Asked by: Miles Briggs, MSP for Lothian, Scottish Conservative and Unionist Party
Date lodged: Thursday, 04 April 2019
Current Status: Answered by Jeane Freeman on 1 May 2019

To ask the Scottish Government when it will publish details of the process for agreeing commercial and data collection arrangements for medicines subject to the new ultra-orphan pathway.

Question reference: S5W-22632

Asked by: Miles Briggs, MSP for Lothian, Scottish Conservative and Unionist Party
Date lodged: Thursday, 11 April 2019
Current Status: Answered by Jeane Freeman on 30 April 2019

To ask the Scottish Government what the average waiting time is for people with blood cancer to receive their first treatment following diagnosis.

The Scottish Government does not collate waiting times for all haematological cancers. However, Lymphoma is included in the current cancer waiting times standards.

Latest published data from Q4 2018 show that 96.1% of Lymphoma patients waiting less than 62 days from urgent referral to first treatment with the median wait being 35 days. In addition once a decision to treat has been made the median wait to first treatment for lymphoma patients was 2 days.

Question reference: S5W-22633

Asked by: Miles Briggs, MSP for Lothian, Scottish Conservative and Unionist Party
Date lodged: Thursday, 11 April 2019
Current Status: Answered by Jeane Freeman on 30 April 2019

To ask the Scottish Government what action it is taking in response to reports that an estimated one in three people with blood cancer see their GP at least three times before being referred for diagnosis.

The Scottish Referral Guidelines for Suspected Cancer were revised in January 2019 and support Primary Care clinicians in identifying patients who are most likely to have cancer and therefore require urgent assessment by a specialist.

The Detect Cancer Early programme first pan-tumour campaign ‘Survivors’, was launched in September 2018, was set out to target those in the most deprived areas, to reduce fear around cancer and encourage people to get checked early.

The Scottish Cancer Coalition was consulted on the campaign’s development – Bloodwise and Leukaemia Care are both members of the forum. A symptom-checker tool was developed to coincide with the campaign to increase awareness and education of possible signs and symptoms of cancer, regardless of the tumour type.

Officials continue to work closely with Health Boards to ensure that the revised referral guidelines are embedded into routine clinical practice.