THE long awaited Public Health Scotland report has revealed that thousands of hospital patients were discharged to care homes without being tested for coronavirus.
However, it says that, allowing for other factors, such as the size of a care home, "hospital discharges were not found to have contributed to a significantly higher risk of an outbreak".
Though it does warn that officials "cannot statistically exclude the presence of a small risk from hospital discharge".
In total, between 1 March and 31 May, there were 5204 discharges of 4807 individuals from NHS hospitals to care homes.
That includes 3599 discharges at the start of the pandemic, between 1 March and 21 April.
The majority of those patients were not tested for Covid 19. Only 650 were - of those 78 received a positive result while in hospital.
Between the end of April and 31 May there were 1605 discharges from hospital to a care homes.
Public Health Scotland say the majority - 1493, 93% - were tested. Of these, 1215 tested negative and 278 tested positive. Of those who tested positive, 233 had a negative test result prior to discharge, meaning 45 did.
Between March 1 and May 31, there were 5,204 discharges from NHS hospitals to care homes, relating to 4,807 individuals, which accounted for 5.3% of all hospital discharges during the same period.
The report states: "It is important to note that there are valid clinical reasons for individuals not to be tested prior to discharge, relating to their capacity to consent to testing and avoiding causing distress, and to appropriateness of testing, e.g. in end of life care situations."
Speaking at the Scottish Government’s daily coronavirus briefing, the First Minister said: “This report is important and it's important for accountability, it's also important for learning, but it is of no comfort, and it never would be of any comfort, to those who lost a loved one.
“So we will be supporting Public Health Scotland to take forward further work and analysis so that we have as detailed and understanding as possible of the outbreaks that did take place in care homes and of course, we will continue our work of the last few months to further improve safety majors in care homes.”
The First Minister also pledged: "Where the reports conclusions highlight the need for additional measures, we will act on that.
"I want people to know we take this very seriously."
News that elderly patients who had tested positive were moved from hospitals into care homes in the weeks before and after lockdown was revealed by the Sunday Post back in August.
That prompted the Health Secretary to order a probe into the practice.
The policy, which was a result of hospitals clearing beds in fear of being overwhelmed by Covid patients, was changed in April, when Jeane Freeman made it a requirement for negative tests before patients could be moved to care homes.
Dr Donald Macaskill, chief executive of Scottish Care which represents independent care homes, told BBC Radio 4's World at One programme: "As an organisation what we would like to see is another piece of research undertaken, because clearly care home staff and providers do believe in some instances that there is a relationship between somebody being admitted from hospital and an outbreak happening."
He added: "I think what this research shows is that up until the point of April 21 when Scotland finally introduced testing of residents on admission to a care home from hospital then we were at a point of vulnerability.
"What it clearly also shows however is that testing people before they get into a care home has huge significance.
"It shows that testing staff is very beneficial and it makes the argument for rapid testing of all those coming into a care home a matter of priority because it's quite clear that the primary infectious route into a care home is what happens in the community."
Scottish Greens Health Spokesperson Alison Johnstone said there were still questions to be asked.
“We’ve known for some time that people who had tested positive or who had not been tested at all were discharged to care homes, but the sheer scale of this scandal is absolutely astonishing.
“The Scottish Government has so far failed to provide a satisfactory explanation as to why it allowed so many potentially infectious people to be discharged to care homes.
“It’s essential that lessons are urgently learned from Spring, to minimise a repeat of this entirely unacceptable situation this winter. The recent outbreaks at care homes in Edinburgh and West Lothian leave me concerned that those lessons have not yet been fully learned.”
Tory shadow health secretary Donald Cameron said: “Today’s overdue report reveals a scandalous dereliction in the provision of public health to some of the most vulnerable people in our society.
“To see people’s worst fears confirmed by these statistics only adds to the need for full and frank disclosure from the SNP.”
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