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In its annual State Of The Nation report today, the Scottish Human Rights Commission (SHRC) has said healthcare is not always available at the point of need.
Urging MSPs and public bodies to use the commission’s findings to make better decisions about legislation, budgeting and services, SHRC chairwoman Professor Angela O’Hagan said: “Human rights set the minimum standards that people in Scotland should be able to depend on, especially during tough times.”
As if to underline the point, Health Secretary Neil Gray has suggested Scots who can afford to pay for a flu vaccination privately should do so, amid criticism over availability of the service on the NHS.
First Minister John Swinney receives his winter flu vaccination at Ocean Terminal, Leith, in Edinburgh | PALatest data shows cases have more than doubled in a week and are likely to rise further over the coming weeks, with hospital admissions up by 70 per cent.
During the Covid pandemic, the flu vaccine was offered by health boards to the over-50s, but this has now been scaled back to the over-65s.
Asked whether people should receive the vaccine privately if they can afford to, Mr Gray said: “Anybody that’s eligible, anyone that’s able to, please pick up the vaccine because it’s clearly helping to avoid hospitalisation and the most serious of illness.”
To govern is to choose. In Scotland, we choose to make a great many services “free”, such as prescriptions for items such as painkillers.
Of course, painkillers are not “free”, they are funded by the taxpayer, along with all kinds of other provisions the Scottish Government likes to present as free, such as bus travel for young people, eye tests, and tuition for Scottish students studying in Scotland.
But as public coffers become ever more stretched, despite Scotland being a heavily taxed part of a UK labouring under the heaviest tax burden since the Second World War, it is surely the case that at some point something has to give.
Many would argue we passed this point a long time ago and that it is high time the Scottish Government got its spending priorities in order.