Scottish A&E waiting times worst on record

Waiting times in Scottish accident and emergency departments were the worst on record in the first week of the year, new figures show.

Almost a third of the 21,163 patients going to A&E took more than four hours to be attended to, the figures show.

The NHS has published weekly statistics for A&E waiting times since 2015.

The figure of 67.4% meeting the four-hour target in the week ending 9 January is the worst ever, down from the previous low of 69.6% in October.

The Scottish government's target of 95% of patients being admitted to the hospital, transferred or discharged within four hours has not been met since July 2020.

Of the 6,902 patients who waited longer than four hours, 2,079 waited over eight hours and 690 people spent more than 12 hours at A&E before being dealt with.

The latest wave of the Covid pandemic and rising staff absences have led to pressure on the NHS across the UK with figures for England showing December was the worst month on record for A&E waiting times.

The NHS England stats split A&E department into three types but the figure across all them showed that 73.3% of patients were seen within four hours last month.

However, just 61.2% of patients were seen within 4 hours in type 1 A&E departments, which are considered to be the major Emergency Departments.

The struggling performance in England and Scotland comes despite the number of people attending A&Es falling.

Scottish Health Secretary Humza Yousaf said the figures were a reminder of the "unprecedented challenges" the NHS continues to face.

The health secretary said: "Today's figures have undoubtedly been impacted by Omicron-related staff absences, with health boards reporting a 31% increase in coronavirus absence compared with the previous week.

"On average, 7,174 NHS staff were absent per day for reasons related to coronavirus, or around 4% of the NHS workforce."

Mr Yousaf said hospital bed occupancy was 44% higher than at the same point the previous week, which adds to the pressures on the NHS.

"Although the next few weeks will undoubtedly continue to be the most difficult very challenging, I would expect to see an improvement in performance next week and in the weeks ahead," he said.

Scottish Conservative health spokesman Dr Sandesh Gulhane called the Scottish statistics a "shameful indictment" of Health Secretary Humza Yousaf's stewardship of NHS.

"How many wake-up calls does the health secretary need before he finally devises a coherent strategy to tackle the unacceptable emergency waiting times in Scotland?" he said.

"Yet his responses feel like a rearranging of the deckchairs on the Titanic."

Scottish Labour's health spokeswoman Jackie Baillie said it was a "deeply worrying development" and lives were being put in danger.

"The cabinet secretary's lack of action in the face of this crisis has been nothing short of a dereliction of duty," she said.