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All parents are invited to consent that their newborn babies undergo the Newborn Bloodspot Screening, the Universal Newborn Hearing Screening and a newborn physical examination.

Scottish prosecution policy was revised in 2005 to allow test purchasing to be used to enforce tobacco sales law for the first time in Scotland. Suggested procedures for local authorities to adopt for undertaking test purchasing in light of this decision are set out in A Practical Guide To Test Purchasing in Scotland, which was published in October 2007:

http://www.scotland.gov.uk/Publications/2007/10/16091941.

In developing these, the Scottish Government-led Age-restricted Products Enforcement Working Group was conscious of the fact that parallel guidance for England and Wales was altered in 2006 to make provision in limited exceptional circumstances for young people to answer untruthfully about their age when attempting a test purchase. Test purchasing has long been a feature of enforcement activity in England and Wales but, given that test purchasing in Scotland is in its comparative infancy and the different judicial system within which it is operated, it was concluded that it would be inappropriate at the present time to adopt a similar approach in Scotland. This stance has the support of all the key interests involved including the Society for Chief Officers for Trading Standards in Scotland (SCOTSS), the Association of Chief Police Officers (ACPOS), and the Crown Office Procurator Fiscal Service (COPFS).

Although the procedures set out in the guide will continue to be kept under active review in the light of any developing operational considerations, the Scottish Government has no plans to substantially alter them at this stage.

The development of the set of suggested procedures for local authorities to adopt for the test purchasing of tobacco (and other age-restricted goods) set out in A Practical Guide To Test Purchasing in Scotland, which was published in October 2007, was overseen by the Scottish Government-led Age-restricted Products Enforcement Working Group and were the result of extensive dialogue with both enforcement agencies, the Society for Chief Officers for Trading Standards in Scotland (SCOTSS) and the Association of Chief Police Officers (ACPOS), and other key interests such as the Crown Office Procurator Fiscal Service (COPFS), the retail sector and organisations representing the interests of young people. The suggested approach draws on the practical experience gained in the tobacco and alcohol test purchasing pilots undertaken in 2004 and 2006 respectively and is intended to ensure that test purchasing is not only conducted in a fair, effective and even handed manner but that the safety and welfare of the young test purchasers is protected at all times.

http://www.scotland.gov.uk/Publications/2007/10/16091941.

Test purchasing activity is, of course, a valuable enforcement tool but it should not be viewed in isolation from other aspects of the Enhanced Tobacco Sales Enforcement Programme to which all local authorities have signed up, such as advice and support to retailers to avoid underage sales. Decisions on specific enforcement policies and actions will necessarily reflect local needs and circumstances and the guide is purely intended to assist such local decision making. Bearing in mind that the welfare and safety of the young test purchaser is paramount, the guide suggests a minimum of two officers should accompany the child or young person during the test purchasing visit. However, it also acknowledges this may not be necessary for young people over 16 and, ultimately, it is for each local authority to determine the safeguards required to protect the interests of the test purchaser based on the individual circumstances of an operation.

In these circumstances, while the procedures set out in the guide will continue to be kept under active review in light of their practical application, the Scottish Government has no plans to substantially alter them at this stage.

We have every reason to be confident of meeting this pledge as the majority of local authorities have extended their free school fruit scheme beyond P1 and P2 pupils already, and we are currently exploring the possibility of securing funding for 10/11 from the EU under the EU school fruit scheme, to extend provision of free school fruit further.

In addition, in June 2008 we published Healthy Eating Active Living “ An action plan to improve diet, increase physical activity and tackle obesity. This included a commitment to broaden out the pledge to provide free fruit to pregnant women and pre-school children using the model of market-led pregnancy cards from the major supermarkets, to encompass maternal and infant nutrition generally and not limited to specific models.

In September 2008, I announced support of £19 million available to NHS health boards over the period 2008-11 to improve the nutrition of women of childbearing age, pregnant women and children under five in disadvantaged areas. The broad criteria within which NHS boards have been asked to work include increasing uptake of the healthy start scheme, to ensure that everyone who is eligible to claim vouchers to exchange for fresh fruit, vegetables, milk and infant formula does so; supporting work on increasing breastfeeding rates and investing in training for health professionals. Years one and two of that funding have already been allocated to NHS boards. Details of the allocation were outlined in CEL 36(2008) Nutrition of women of childbearing age, pregnant women and children under five in disadvantaged areas, which can be found at http://www.sehd.scot.nhs.uk/mels/CEL2008_36.pdf.

I have asked Mike Ewart, Chief Executive of the Scottish Prison Service (SPS), to respond. His response is as follows:

All prisoners have health care screening on admission into custody and have access to doctors, nurses and the wider health care team to address any emerging health care needs during their time in prison. All care is based on individualised health care need and age is no barrier to accessing treatment and the management of life-long conditions.

In addition, the SPS provides health and lifestyle promotion, including the provision of well man and well women clinics across our prisons. SPS is also planning the introduction of a Keep Well community lifestyle screening programme to older prisoners, which will provide a specific additional health assessment to improve the early identification and targeting of prisoners at particular risk of preventable serious ill-health, continuing their care through a prison sentence and afterwards in the community.

This information is not collected centrally.

The General Medical Council (GMC) is the independent regulator for doctors in the United Kingdom and its role is to protect, promote and maintain the health and safety of the public.

All doctors are expected to practise in accordance with GMC published guidance including Good Medical Practice, which sets out advice on the essential elements of care, including the need to provide treatments that best serve the patient''s needs and the need to provide treatments that are based on the best available evidence, and Consent: Patients and Doctors Making Decisions Together, which reminds doctors of their responsibilities in relation to discussing treatment options including the potential side-effects, complications and other risks associated with these together with the need to seek consent to treatment.

The GMC has strong and effective legal powers designed to ensure proper standards in the practice of medicine, including taking action where those standards have not been met.

The Survey of School Meals 2009 was published on 23 June 2009 and table 20 shows the number and percentage of schools in each local authority who have extended their free fruit scheme beyond P1-P2 pupils. We do not hold information on the number, or year group, of pupils who received free fruit http://www.scotland.gov.uk/Publications/2009/06/22104701/0.

The successful implementation of the Scottish smoke-free legislation has undoubtedly reduced exposure to second-hand smoke among children in Scotland, partly as a result of the greater awareness among their parents and those close to them about the risks of second-hand smoke. While there are currently no plans to extend the smoke-free laws to private cars, the Scottish Government is conscious that private cars are now one of the main places for exposure of children to second-hand smoke. In conjunction with our health improvement partners, therefore, we will continue to do all we can to highlight the risks posed by second-hand smoke.

Rates of false-positive and false negative toxin tests are not routinely held or collected in diagnostic laboratories. The calculation of such rates for any type of laboratory test implies comparison with some form of gold-standard test which is often not suited to routine diagnostic use. In the case of C.difficile, cell culture-based cytotoxicity assay is currently considered the gold standard. However this type of assay is technically difficult and time-consuming to carry out (as it requires that cell cultures are maintained) and has a built-in time delay three days or more before test results are available. As such false-positive and false-negative estimations are usually part of specific evaluation studies to test the effectiveness of different types of assay.