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The number of needles distributed to drugs users in Glasgow in; (a) 2015-16 can be found at
https://www.isdscotland.org/Health-Topics/Drugs-and-Alcohol-Misuse/Publications/2017-06-13/2017-06-13-IEP-Report.pdf ;

(b) 2016-17 can be found at
https://www.isdscotland.org/Health-Topics/Drugs-and-Alcohol-Misuse/Publications/2018-08-07/2018-08-07-IEP-Report.pdf .

The data for 2017-18 and 2018-19 will be published by Information Services Division in due course.

The use of social prescribing is an emerging practice to complement healthcare provision, so that people can make informed choices about their care in line with their preferences.

The Scottish Government supports all efforts to support and encourage people to take part in sport and physical activity, and looks forward to seeing evidence as it develops on how social prescribing initiatives can contribute to this goal.

I note that the research referred to examined the causes of the outbreak of HIV amongst people who inject drugs in Glasgow, which was identified in 2015. It was the product of collaboration between Glasgow Caledonian University, Health Protection Scotland, and NHS Greater Glasgow and Clyde. Scottish Government officials have well-established working relationships with several authors of the paper, including colleagues from each of the above organisations.

I visited the Brownlee clinic, which is leading the medical response to this outbreak, in November 2018 and visited Waverley Care’s street support team, which works to provide treatment support and testing, in July 2019.

NHS Lothian and NHS Highland have reported that they currently have waiting lists for access to pre-exposure prophylaxis (PrEP).

NHS Greater Glasgow and Clyde is leading the response to the HIV outbreak amongst people who inject drugs in Glasgow. This is an important issue; I take a keen interest in the response to this outbreak and note that a great deal of work is going into supporting this vulnerable group.

We are providing £2.13m over three years to third sector organisations to support innovative work to tackle poor sexual health and reduce blood borne virus transmissions. This includes funding for Scottish Drugs Forum to work with people who inject drugs to help them reduce risk behaviours connected with HIV and other sexually transmitted infections.

Scotland's Digital Health and Care Strategy recognises the benefits that technology can have in supporting the NHS to improve services.
The Scottish Government invests around £89m each year to implement a range of improvements including; provision of national GP IT systems to replace ageing local systems, a modern replacement for the Community Health Index and Child Health Systems and a national contract with Microsoft which will ensure that all boards have access to the latest technologies to support modern working practices and ensure they maintain cyber resilience.

As part of that, the Scottish Government's Technology Enabled Care Programme has also seen significant success in implementing technology to support more person-centred care. This includes for example the implementation of the Attend Anywhere Video Consultation Platform (also known as NHS Near Me) as well as the scale up in the use of the Home and Mobile Health Monitoring system FLORENCE which supports self-management of conditions such as high blood pressure using SMS Text Messaging.

a) The Scottish Health Survey (SHeS) was established in 1995 and repeated in 1998 and 2003. It has been carried out annually since 2008.

There are two versions of the survey each year, version A and version B. Version A accounts for around 2/3 rd of the sample and includes a set of core questions and a set of modules on specific health conditions that rotate in and out of the survey. Version B accounts for the remaining 1/3 rd of the sample and includes the core questions and a biological measures module.

Full copies of the questionnaires used in SHeS are included in the appendix of the technical report for each corresponding year, available here:

https://www2.gov.scot/Topics/Statistics/Browse/Health/scottish-health-survey/Publications

The 2018 Scottish Health Survey is due to be published in September 2019. A report on questionnaire changes that were made from 2018 onwards is available here: https://www2.gov.scot/Resource/0053/00537370.pdf

b) The Health and Wellbeing (HWB) Census questionnaire is still in the process of being developed and will ask questions that cover the following topics/themes against the SHANARRI indicators (Safe, Healthy, Active, Nurtured, Achieving, Responsible, Respected and Included).

As the HWB Census is going to be asked of children from Primary 5 to Secondary 6 a number of questionnaires are in the process of being finalised, and each questionnaire is designed to include questions that are age/stage appropriate. For example, some topics/themes will only be asked of older children (e.g. mental health and substance use will only be asked of Secondary 2 pupils upwards, and sexual health questions will only be asked of Secondary 4 pupils and upwards).

The Scottish Government is taking a number of measures to ensure Scottish domiciled students from all sectors of society can access medical courses. By 2021 overall medical undergraduate numbers will have increased by 190 places (or 22%) over 2016 levels. This includes, since 2016, 50 ring-fenced widening access places focused on SIMD 20 applicants. For the 2019-20 intake, we have set a new target for Scottish domiciled and the rest of EU medical students in line with Scottish Government guidance to increase retention of medical students, replacing 100 rest of UK medical students with 100 Scottish domiciled/EU students on a phased basis over the next three years. We have also increased the number of students on our targeted pre-medical entry courses from 40 to 50, focused on socially disadvantaged as well as remote & rural applicants, and continue to fund our Scottish Graduate Entry (ScotGEM) programme which includes a return of service bursary.

I refer the member to Scottish Parliament Information Centre (SPICe) Bib number: 60845

The Scottish Government is already taking substantive steps to support families from before birth through the critical early years of a child’s life.

We published our Tackling Child Poverty Delivery Plan – Year One Progress Report on 26 June which sets out actions we have taken over the past year to tackle child poverty. In this report we set out the support Scottish Government provides to children and families through the course of their lives.

This includes: the Universal Health Visiting Pathway; Best Start Grant payments, Best Start Food payments from August 2019; and the doubling of Early Learning and Childcare to 1140 hours.

Moreover the recently announced Scottish Child Payment will provide further support of £10 per week, per child with no limit on the number of children families can receive support for. The benefit will be fully rolled out by 2022, with early-rollout available in 2021 for children under six. The benefit will mean that a family with two children will be more than £1000 better off each year.

All of these actions are taken as part of a wider, direct, investment of roughly £527 million specifically targeted at low income families with children, which does not include the universal investment which supports all families with children in Scotland.