‘Hospital murdered my child’, mum tells inquiry – STV news

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A mother whose daughter died at a children’s cancer ward after contracting an infection has described her child’s death as “murder”.

Kimberly Darroch told the Scottish Hospitals Inquiry she wants the children and adult hospitals at the Queen Elizabeth University Hospital (QEUH) campus in Glasgow to close.

She believes NHS Greater Glasgow and Clyde health board should be punished after she claims staff covered up the true cause of her daughter’s death, which she found out about two years later in the media.

The inquiry began hearing evidence on Monday into problems at two flagship hospitals that contributed to the deaths of two children.

It is investigating the construction of the QEUH campus in Glasgow and the Royal Hospital for Children and Young People and Department of Clinical Neurosciences in Edinburgh.

In a statement read out at the inquiry on Wednesday, Ms Darroch said she was never given details of an infection that her daughter contracted when she died, which she later discovered contributed towards her death.

Ms Darroch also claimed hospital reports about her meeting with doctors to discuss the infection were false.

Her statement said: “My view is that the hospital should be closed. I don’t think it’s safe.

“I feel like the health board need to be punished for all of this. In my eyes, what happened to my daughter is murder.

“She should still be here and I am trying to come to terms with that, after coming to terms with losing her initially.

“I don’t know that I’ll ever be able to. I would never go back to the hospital, never.”

Ms Darroch’s daughter, ten-year-old Milly Main, was diagnosed with acute lymphoblastic leukaemia in 2012.

‘Hospital murdered my child’, mum tells inquiry

Sturgeon under fire as Scotland spends three times more on rail services than England – Yahoo news

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Nicola Sturgeon has been accused of wasting taxpayers’ money after figures showed that Scotland is spending three times as much as England on keeping railway services running during Covid.

Holyrood has paid almost £60 for every passenger journey since the pandemic struck compared with £22 south of the border, according to analysis by The Telegraph.

In Scotland, this equates to £1.86 for every kilometre each passenger has travelled, compared with 69p in England.

Rail operators on both sides of the border were effectively nationalised to prevent them going bust during the first lockdown, costing billions of pounds of public money. Politicians are now struggling to work out how to handle the ongoing financial burden of running services, amid fears that mass commuting will never return after Covid.

Ms Sturgeon’s administration decided on Monday to keep its two operators on emergency rail contracts until the end of the year. By contrast, in Westminster operators have been transferred onto less lucrative terms to try to limit the burden on taxpayers.

MSP Graham Simpson, the Scottish Conservatives’ shadow transport minister, said: “Scottish taxpayers are shelling out three times more for an SNP rail service that hasn’t operated on a Sunday in seven months and plans to slash hundreds of services.

“Rail users aren’t seeing value for money and the SNP-Green government needs to ensure that under nationalisation the rail services work for the passenger, not the operator.”

The decision came as the SNP fights a bitter industrial dispute with the RMT guards union. Passengers have suffered weekend rail disruption for several months as a result.

In Westminster, the Department for Transport is under orders from the Treasury to cut a rail subsidy that has ballooned to more than £10bn across England. The burden on the public purse is to be reduced through an increase in demand as more commuters return to work, coupled with budget cuts.

Bosses in England are in talks with union leaders to axe thousands of jobs and reduce service levels in order to balance the books.

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Military personnel will deploy to support Scottish Ambulance Service – STV news

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Hundreds of military personnel will be deployed to support the Scottish Ambulance Service.

The UK Government approved the support through the Military Assistance to the Civil Authority (MACA) process.

It comes after a request from the Scotland Office, working with the Scottish Government, to tackle long response times, with the ambulance service under severe pressure due to the pandemic.

Last week at Holyrood, First Minister Nicola Sturgeon announced that consideration was being given to asking for targeted military assistance to help with “short-term pressure points”.

It has now been confirmed that from Saturday, the Ministry of Defence will provide 114 people to augment ambulance drivers.

This will include drivers and support staff, who will provide resilience to the Scottish Ambulance Service by carrying out non-emergency driving work, with each being paired with a clinical professional.

A further 111 personnel will operate Mobile Testing Units, which the military previously supported in 2020.

They will be utilised to help identify infections and break chains of transmission, with their work beginning on Wednesday, September 29.

Brigadier Ben Wrench, commander of Joint Military Command Scotland said: “The Armed Forces in Scotland continue to support the Scottish Government’s response to the pandemic.

“We are working closely with the Scottish Government and Scottish Ambulance Service, following their requests for assistance with drivers and Mobile Testing Units.”

UK defence secretary Ben Wallace praised the lifesaving service being provided by members of the Armed forces.

“Our Armed Forces are once again stepping up, demonstrating their versatility as we support the Covid-19 response across the UK,” he said.

Military personnel will deploy to support Scottish Ambulance Service

Fatal accident inquiry waiting times ‘increase by a third’ – STV news

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Waiting times for fatal accident inquiries (FAIs) have jumped by more than a third since last year, according to the Scottish Conservatives.

The Crown Office and Procurator Fiscal Service (COPFS) said last year’s figures include five cases, each lasting five years, which have now concluded, and therefore the data is misleading.

But in response to a freedom of information request submitted by the Tories, COPFS data showed the average time taken to complete an FAI has risen by more than eight months, from 691 days in 2019-20 to 939 in 2020-21 – an increase of 36%.

The Tories said that in 2020-21 only two FAIs were completed within 12 months, and it took more than five years to conclude five inquiries. One inquiry from June 2012 was still open after almost a decade.

COPFS said it concluded 57 FAIs in 2019-20 and 59 between April 2020 and March 2021.

The majority of FAIs are completed between 12 and 18 months, according to the data.

Responding to the figures, Scottish Conservative shadow justice secretary Jamie Greene said: “It is unacceptable that the families of victims should have to wait so long for closure while these inquiries move at a snail’s pace.

“Fatal accident inquiries must be conducted quickly, especially when there is cause for public concern. Nine years and counting is an outrageous length of time.

Fatal accident inquiry waiting times ‘increase by a third’

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Parents have ‘lost faith in hospital as safe place for children’ – STV news

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Many parents whose children were treated at the Queen Elizabeth University Hospital have lost faith in it as a safe place for them to be cared for and want answers over what went wrong, an inquiry has heard.

The Scottish Hospitals Inquiry began hearing evidence on Monday into problems at two flagship Scottish hospitals that contributed to the deaths of two children.

It is investigating the construction of the Queen Elizabeth University Hospital (QEUH) campus in Glasgow and the Royal Hospital for Children and Young People and Department of Clinical Neurosciences in Edinburgh.

The inquiry was ordered after patients at the Glasgow hospital died from infections linked to pigeon droppings and the water supply, and the opening of the Edinburgh site was delayed due to concerns over the ventilation system.

Steve Love QC is appearing on behalf of 54 parents or family members of patients, represented by Thompsons Solicitors Scotland, who were or are still being treated on the children’s cancer ward and neonatal unit at QEUH.

In his opening statement, he said: “The children of those we represent were admitted to hospital for treatment for serious illnesses such as conditions like leukaemia and other cancers as well as other serious medical issues and they reasonably expected that the best possible medical care and treatment would be provided for their children in a suitably safe and clean hospital environment.

“Your Lordship will be told that what they in fact faced was serious infections, life threatening additional illnesses and a catalogue of other problems as a result of the hospital environment, the hospital water supply and the conduct of some of the medical staff there.”

He said that “significant numbers” suffered infection from 2017 onwards and that parents “could not believe that the hospital environment was as far as they were concerned making their already sick children more ill”.

Parents have ‘lost faith in hospital as safe place for children’

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Zero-emission submarine project wins UK Government funding – STV news

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A firm developing zero-emission submarines which could transport cargo between Glasgow and Belfast has been awarded a share of £23m of UK Government green maritime funding.

The fully automated vessels are designed to be “net positive” by running on green hydrogen and collecting microplastics, the Department for Transport (DfT) said.

A fleet could secure 27 tonnes of CO2 emissions in the first year of operation, according to the DfT.

Another project awarded UK Government funding is developing electric boat chargepoints connected to offshore wind turbines.

They would operate in a similar way to electric car chargers, with sailors plugging in, charging their vessel and sailing away.

The use of renewable energy in this way could be equivalent to taking more than 62,000 cars off the road, the DfT said.

The competition winners were announced as part of London International Shipping Week.

Transport secretary Grant Shapps said: “As a proud island nation built on our maritime prowess, it is only right that we lead by example when it comes to decarbonising the sector and building back greener.

Zero-emission submarine project wins UK Government funding

The Fall Guy: Humza Yousaf takes a tumble as Scottish Government’s failings on health exposed again – StephenDaisly.com

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Someone — not, as is often claimed, Churchill — said the best argument against democracy was five minutes with the average voter.

Except, that is, in Scotland, where two minutes with the average Cabinet minister will produce much the same effect. Humza Yousaf didn’t utter a peep at First Minister’s Questions but his ears must’ve been burning because the whole 45 minutes was a raised-voices, furrowed-brows, heavy-sighing run-through of his report card after five months as health secretary. It was less a parliamentary Q&A than an incredibly awkward parents’ night broadcast live on BBC Scotland. Mammy Nicola took her wee angel’s side, of course, but she did so with a look that said: ‘Just wait till I get you home.’

Things were already going badly for Yousaf. Reliant on a knee-walker thanks to a recent badminton injury — you couldn’t get more Broughty Ferry if you tried — the health secretary who earlier this week warned Scots to ‘think twice’ before phoning for an ambulance tried racing his scooter up a notoriously slippery corridor outside the debating chamber only to dokey over and land in a manner reminiscent of Stan Laurel. The health secretary has a knack for slapstick comedy: he’s three stooges for the price of one.

Having already beclowned himself, Yousaf volunteered his face for another cream pie by whipping out his phone and griping to Twitter about the BBC’s political editor Glenn Campbell posting a video of his tumble. That he got so salty only guaranteed that the clip was shared farther and wider on social media. The nine-second scene is this generation’s Zapruder film. Years from now, people will ask, ‘Do you remember where you were the day Humza Yousaf made a complete prat of himself?’ and other people will reply, ‘Sorry, could you narrow it down a bit?’

Ambulance crisis caused by more than pandemic, senior surgeon warns – STV news

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A majority of the issues in Scotland’s hospitals and the knock-on effect to the ambulance service are not due to Covid, a top surgeon has said.

Professor Michael Griffin, president of the Royal College of Surgeons of Edinburgh, warned Scotland has “a real workforce problem in the NHS and in social care” that needs to be addressed and it is causing a “vicious circle” impacting all parts of the health service.

He told BBC Radio Scotland’s Good Morning Scotland programme that increasing numbers of Covid cases and infected patients in hospitals are adding to the “very, very complex problem” facing the health service – including under pressure paramedics.

It comes after the Scottish Government officially requested help from the army to support the ambulance service amid deteriorating response times.

“It’s not just due to Covid,” Prof Griffin said, adding that the pandemic is responsible for “probably 30-40% of the issues that we’re seeing”.

He said: “With the reduction in elective surgery in many of the health boards across Scotland, it’s not just Covid.

“It has a significant contribution, but there are other multiple factors involved and it’s quite a complex situation.

“We have staff absences from illness, recruitment and isolation, such that we’re not able to staff certain areas.

Ambulance crisis caused by more than pandemic, senior surgeon warns

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More than 4400 Covid vaccine doses ‘wasted in one week in Scotland’ – STV news

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More than 4400 doses of coronavirus vaccine were wasted in Scotland in one week, figures have revealed.

Statistics published by the Scottish Government under freedom of information requests showed that in the week ending August 1, a total of 4,448 doses of vaccine were not administered.

Between February and July the number totalled 34,026.

The Scottish Government said there are “several reasons a vaccine may not be administered before being discarded, and therefore ‘wasted’”, including issues with storage, expired doses and “specific clinical situations where there may be some dose loss”.

The figures covered all three of the coronavirus vaccines being given in Scotland – Pfizer, AstraZeneca and Moderna – with the total wasted amounting to 0.51% of the 6,643,551 jabs given.

However the statistics do not include wastage of vaccines in GPs practices, as “GPs do not record this information”.

The figures were released as the Scottish Government continues to urge everyone who is eligible to get vaccinated against Covid-19.

From Monday this will include healthy youngsters aged between 12 and 15, after First Minister Nicola Sturgeon announced the vaccine programme was being expanded following advice from the UK’s chief medical officers.

More than 4400 Covid vaccine doses ‘wasted in one week in Scotland’

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New CalMac Islay ferries will not be built in Scotland – STV news

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Two new ferries for Islay will not be made in Scotland after four shipyards from elsewhere were invited to tender for the contract.

More than 30 organisations expressed an interest in taking on the job and 11 entered submissions that Caledonian Maritime Assets Limited (CMAL) said were “rigorously” assessed.

But only four companies, one from Romania, another from Poland and two in Turkey, reached the final stage of the procurement process.

A decision on which shipyard will win the job will be made before the end of March 2022, CMAL said.

The Islay route is one of the busiest services for freight on the Clyde and Hebrides network, and it was decided to contract two new ferries after discussions with Transport Scotland, ferry operator CalMac and communities on the island.

This week CMAL announced that the new vessels will be built at either Damen Shipyard in Romania, Remontowa Shipbuilding in Poland, or one of the Turkish shipyards Sefine Denizcilik Tersanecilik Turizm or Cemre Marin Endustri.

The procurement process for new ferries has come under scrutiny recently because of issues with two vessels from the publicly-owned Ferguson Marine shipyard in Inverclyde.

Holyrood’s rural economy and connectivity committee described the process as a “catastrophic failure”.

New CalMac Islay ferries will not be built in Scotland

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