THOUSANDS of Scots were forced to wait more than a day in A&E before they were attended, according to grim new figures obtained by Scottish Labour.
The Scottish Government's target is for 95 per cent of all patients presenting at casualty to be seen and subsequently admitted or discharged within four hours.
However, it has not been met nationally since July 2020.
Despite a sharp improvement in the last week, less than two-thirds of patients were see within the target time.
Anas Sarwar used him at First Minister's Questions to raise the NHS for the fifteenth week in a row.
He told MSPs that 6,362 people waited more than 24 hours in A&E last year. In 2019, he added, that number was just 48.
The Labour leader said some people had waited even longer: “1,356 people waited more than 36 hours in A&E, 90 people waited more than 48 hours - that's two whole days waiting in A&E.
“This is the worst it has ever been. Staff are burned out. Patients lives are at risk. And A&E doctors are telling us that 36 people could die due to long wait this week alone.
“So what is the First Minister doing right now to prevent these unnecessary deaths this week, next week and in future weeks?”
The First Minister said there had been drops in the number of people forced to endure lengthy waits since the start of January.
She said the government was hopeful that the “severity of the winter crisis” was now easing.
“Long waits, whether in accident and emergency units or in any other part of the NHS are unacceptable, and they do have consequences which is why we work so hard to reduce and eliminate long waits in the NHS.
“Of course, there is always something missing from Anas Sarwar's questions - important though these questions are - when he compares figures from 2018 to now and that of course is a global pandemic that we have been dealing with in the intervening period.”
Mr Sarwar then quoted a nurse who claimed that the Scottish Government did not see “patients as human beings, as someone's mum or someone's dad.”
“And it's not good enough for the First Minister to keep making excuses or to talk about Covid,” he added. “Because demand on A&E is actually down by nearly 120,000 people compared to 2019.
“Fewer people are using A&E but waiting times are longer than they've ever been.
“Scotland's NHS is a breaking point and things are only getting worse on Nicola Sturgeon’s watch.
“The longest ever waits at A&E, patients waiting hours in ambulances to even get into A&E, one in seven Scots on an NHS waiting list and record-breaking delayed discharge.
“Our NHS, our patients and our staff deserve so much better than this.
“So why should people across Scotland continue to accept the unacceptable from this SNP Government?”
The First Minister replied: “Every single patient seen on our national health service is a human being, and frankly I think it demeans Anas Sarwar's argument to suggest that any of us don't think that is the case.”
Ms Sturgeon said she and Health Secretary Humza Yousaf took responsibility for NHS Scotland "every single day of the week."
"But Anas Sarwar's argument seems to be that this is all somehow uniquely down to the SNP," she said.
“And I know he doesn't like comparisons. But if he's going to make that argument, then I'm afraid they are inevitable.
“If it's all down to the SNP, then why is it that in the latest full month that we have statistics for, A&E performance in Scotland is 6.2 percentage points better than it is in Wales where Labour is in government?
“The fact of the matter is pressure on the health service is intense in Scotland, England, Wales and Northern Ireland. We are dealing with that pressure and in many respects, those who work so hard across NHS Scotland are doing a better job than we find in many other parts of the UK.”
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