Government was too slow off the mark... and it has cost lives

A GREAT and dangerous modern myth is that the Scottish Government has responded to and dealt with the coronavirus pandemic with greater skill and care than its UK counterparts.

This divisive belief is wholly incorrect. Throughout the crisis, both the national Government and the devolved administrations have been in lockstep with each other.

The measures announced by both Prime Minister Boris Johnson and First Minister Nicola Sturgeon have been virtually identical.

But if any administration has badly underperformed it is the Scottish Government – particularly on the vital rollout of the coronavirus vaccines.

Over recent weeks, this newspaper has urged the Scottish Government to follow the lead of Ministers south of the Border and hugely quicken the rollout of the life-saving vaccines.

But it is an undeniable fact that the vaccination programme in Scotland has been lagging behind the rest of the UK.

Scotland has vaccinated just 380,667 people compared to 5,526,071 in England – around six per cent of the total south of the Border.

The number of people vaccinated in Scotland has fallen for three days in a row, from 25,300 to 22,213 while there are a record number 2.085 people in hospital with coronavirus.

Even last Saturday when the NHS Louisa Jordan hospital opened up to vaccinate 5,000 health workers, it promptly shut its doors again the next day.

It is welcome news that, from this weekend, the vaccine will start to be administered every day of the week. However, this is four weeks overdue.

A Scottish Government spokesman said Ministers were ‘actively considering’ providing a seven-day-a-week jab service at a number of other locations.

We feel bound to ask why this is a matter that requires further debate. Coronavirus has claimed the lives of almost 6,000 Scots and left countless families broken and bereaved.

It has thrown the economy into crisis and heaped pressure on our children, whose education has now been disrupted for almost a year.

We can think of no reason whatsoever, in the face of this evidence, that vaccinations should not be offered seven days a week at every facility.

Medical staff have confirmed their status as heroes in the past year. The risks taken by doctors, nurses and others in treating those laid low by coronavirus cannot be underestimated.

The pressure many frontline NHS staff are under will only begin to relent when sufficient numbers of people have been vaccinated and the threat of widespread infection subsides.

Equally, the return to normality of our schools and the rebuilding of those businesses which have survived during a desperately difficult year is dependent on sufficient numbers of Scots being vaccinated.

When this pandemic has passed there will be an audit of how Ministers handled the challenges. Health Secretary Jeane Freeman’s report card should mark her down as an abject failure. The decision last year to allow Covid-19 positive pensioners to return from hospitals to care homes had a devastating impact and cost many lives.

To that appalling mistake we should add the SNP government’s decision not to deliver the vaccine every day of the week.

This weekend, Ministers have, finally, started to correct this mistake but until they ensure that every available facility is vaccinating seven days a week they will not be able to claim to be doing all they can to fight this terrible virus.