Meeting of the Parliament 25 March 2026 [Draft]
Earlier this week, the Royal College of Emergency Medicine published its “State of Emergency Medicine in Scotland” report, and it is pretty grim reading. The college estimates that, in 2025, 818 deaths were linked to prolonged emergency department waits—a situation that remains unchanged from 2024. In the North East Scotland region, which I have had the privilege to represent for the past five years, just over a third of patients attending the Aberdeen royal infirmary ED were admitted, transferred or discharged within four hours, which is well below the 95 per cent national health service standard—some 17.4 per cent of patients waited 12 hours or more for care.
What is the Scottish Government doing to reduce avoidable deaths as a result of long emergency department waits and to improve hospital flow? When will it adopt a whole-system approach, with responsibility shared across the entire patient pathway?