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It is not possible to determine how many people contracted HIV in any given year as people may not be tested or diagnosed for a number of years after they contract HIV.

Public Health Scotland (PHS) publishes an annual HIV in Scotland surveillance report which includes data on new diagnoses. The report includes indicators of recently acquired infections and late diagnoses since 2017, however this does not identify the year in which people acquired HIV. In addition to this there are a number of people who remain undiagnosed, which is why it is important that anyone who thinks they may have been at risk seeks a HIV test.

Data on the number of new HIV diagnoses in Scotland each year from 2014 to 2023 can be found in Table 3 of the latest HIV in Scotland report at: https://publichealthscotland.scot/media/29204/final-hiv-in-scotland-update-to-31-december-2023-1.pdf.

Falling birth rates are a demographic trend replicated across many high-income countries, with significant future implications for our economies, communities and public services.

The Family Friendly Nation strand of our Population Strategy sets out our ambition to ensure Scotland is the ideal place to raise a family. In delivering this, in November 2022, the Ministerial Population Taskforce published ‘Attitudes to Family Formation in Scotland’ to update our evidence base about family planning and ideal family size.

Next steps are being considered by the Taskforce, including scoping potential policy lessons from international comparators to support people to have the number of children they wish to have.

The Scottish Government does not comment on the internal affairs of non-SG bodies.

The Scottish Government is fully committed to improving and protecting the welfare of all animals in Scotland. The Animal Health and Welfare (Scotland) Act 2006 protects animals in Scotland, including livestock, and in November 2023 we published our own pig welfare guidance to further improve the welfare of farmed pigs. The Welfare of Farmed Animals (Scotland) Regulations 2010 was updated to include this updated guidance.

There are a range of commercial digital products available to schools aimed at improving children's reading.

Some schools in Scotland are already using these approaches to improve children's reading and Education Scotland, the Scottish education agency, will continue to explore the evidence base and relative effectiveness of these and how to best share good practice in this area.

The Scottish Government is committed to the plans for a National Care Service, and Scottish Ministers are continuing work on progressing this as quickly and effectively as possible.

In the last seven years we have invested over £2 million in the Healthy Living Programme, to help convenience stores offer healthier choices. More than two-thirds of the 2,300 strong Healthy Living Programme membership serves the most deprived areas of the country and ensures access to affordable, healthier food and drink in those communities.

Public Health Scotland published an evaluation on the Programme last year: Evaluation of the Scottish Grocers’ Federation Healthy Living Programme - Evaluation of the Scottish Grocers’ Federation Healthy Living Programme - Publications - Public Health Scotland. The evaluation shows that the Programme has increased the availability of healthier options in the sector and provides recommendations to further expand its reach and scope, for instance, through sector-wide healthier promotions.

We have also invested over £600,000 in the last seven years to help smaller businesses reformulate common products to make them healthier. This is playing an important role in improving dietary health by removing hundreds of millions of calories from Scottish food and drink products sold across the country, including deprived areas.

The Reformulation for Health Programme is administered by the Food and Drink Federation Scotland with additional support from Food Standards Scotland, Scotland Food & Drink and trade associations for relevant manufacturing sectors such as Scottish Bakers.

This was also discussed as part of the Population Health Framework development roundtable with Public Health and business stakeholders in September.

While local authorities are responsible for the recruitment and deployment of teachers, the Scottish Government is committed to maximising the number of jobs available in a range of subjects, including computing science.

The Teaching Bursary Scheme offers a £20,000 payment to career changers who are looking to undertake graduate teacher training in hard-to-fill STEM subjects, including computing science.

We are currently exploring a pilot programme that would create more computing science teachers through the University of Aberdeen. Once finalised, further detail will be announced.

In addition, we are working with Scottish Teachers Advancing Computing Science (STACS) to consider wider initiatives to promote teaching as a valued career choice for computing students.

We have also asked our Strategic Board for Teacher Education to develop advice on how we can encourage more people into teaching, particularly in subjects we know are challenging to fill.

We do not yet have a timescale for publishing the Fisheries Climate Change Action Plan. Further work is required, in partnership with stakeholders, to develop a clear plan of actions which will support fisheries in the drive to net zero.

Many of the actions that are required will need to be developed and initiated by the fishing industry and others in the private sector (for example vessel designers). Regulators and policy makers will also need to identify and remove barriers where this is possible.

The Scottish Government have no plans to request this.

Scottish Water has a programme of installing blue top up taps in communities across Scotland, with over 120 installed and providing fresh drinking water for bottle refills. However they are not in a position to support the refurbishing/reuse of existing architecture and historic fountains and wells. These older pieces of equipment present a number of issues around health and safety risks, use of historic materials, location, the bespoke nature of every site and ultimately the inability to guarantee water quality. The taps provided by Scottish Water are Water Regulation Approval Scheme (WRAS) approved, which provides an enhanced level of water quality protection. This level of assurance would be very difficult and costly to achieve via pre-existing historic structures – and in some cases it may not be possible.

The Scottish Government has no current plans to update the 2005 Guidance for Local Authorities and National Park Authorities on Part 1 of the Land Reform (Scotland) Act 2003.