Health board are hiding the truth from First Minister, Labour leader claims

Nicola Sturgeon is either being lied to by the leadership of the under-fire Queen Elizabeth University Hospital, or she is hiding the truth from parliament, Anas Sarwar has claimed. 

The Labour leader made the allegation as he raised the case of another child who died at the Glasgow hospital campus after contracting an infection.

A six-month-old baby in the intensive unit care died from Serratia, a deadly bacteria linked to water and the hospital environment. 

The health board said Sarwar's accusation was untrue and accused him of questioning the "integrity and professionalism of our frontline staff".

The MSP had asked the First Minister for details of the three healthcare infection incident assessment tool (HIIAT) notices sent to the government by the health board to formally report on outbreaks in the hospital. 

Sturgeon told MSPs there were two reds and one amber on 12 January, 7 May and 23 June this year.

She said it was wrong to suggest that the QEUH was  “somehow an unsafe hospital”. 

“There were those three alerts in relation to the Queen Elizabeth, in the same time frame, 45 were notified across Scotland as a whole. 

“So let me just give some context around that, the Queen Elizabeth represents over 11 per cent of all adult acute beds in Scotland, but less than 7 per cent of these HIIAT notifications. 

“We take all of these concerns very seriously, but I really think it is also important that we don't have politicians coming to this chamber and trying to suggest and to erode confidence in the quality of care that is provided by dedicated clinicians in the Queen Elizabeth Hospital every single day.”

Sarwar replied: “I think you need to understand what's happening in this health board because clearly either you're not being told the truth, or you're hiding the truth. And I prefer to believe the first.” 

He added: “When these infections happen, they should be notified so the government can take the necessary action. So let me give you an example, while the First Minister has been hiding behind process and a public inquiry that could take three more years, patients are still getting infections, and lives are still being lost. 

“I raised cases of Aspergillus as Stenotrophomonas in this parliament, those cases should trigger HIIAT red warnings. 

“But yesterday I spoke to a mother, who in recent weeks, tragically lost her six-month-old baby.  The child was in an intensive care unit at the children's hospital at the Queen Elizabeth university campus. She shared the death certificate with me. Listed as a cause of death is Serratia, another deadly bacteria linked to water and the hospital environment. From the indication from the First Minister that didn’t trigger a HIIAT red warning.” 

“Another child's death. Another grieving family. What's it going to take for action?” Sarwar asked.

The First Minister said HIIAT alerts were only triggered when there were two or more linked infections because that would be indicative of an outbreak, rather than isolated cases of infection. 

“Basically, the reality here for every hospital across the world is despite the best efforts and the highest quality of care, it is not possible to prevent every case of infection, in very sick patients with compromised immune systems.”

The First Minister rejected claims of a “cover up”. 

“I know from my experience as health secretary, from my experience as First Minister, from my experience as a citizen and at times a user of the health service, I know how seriously clinicians take the duty of candour and honesty to patients. The government takes it so seriously that we changed the law to make a duty of candour a legal obligation. So I have confidence in clinicians. 

“If the allegation is, as it appears to be, that health boards or in this case Greater Glasgow Clyde Health Board is pressurising or bullying or telling clinicians not to be honest with patients then my message not to Anas Sarwar but directly to every clinician across Greater Glasgow and Clyde, employees across the country, if they feel they are in that position, they should raise that in a way they see fit. And they should come to me directly because that is not acceptable and would not be acceptable.” 

NHS Greater Glasgow and Clyde said: "Any suggestion that NHS Greater Glasgow and Clyde withholds information or is ‘hiding the truth’ from Government, or from patients or families, is categorically untrue.

"By making these unacceptable claims, the integrity and professionalism of our frontline staff is once again being called into question.

"We have been, and remain, fully committed to being completely open and transparent in all that we do and we are dismayed that claims to the contrary are being repeated.

"The assessment of infection incidents is a rigorous process undertaken by our frontline clinical staff and infection control teams. The output from this process is governed by national guidance and assessments are submitted to the national reporting body ARHAI. All of these reports are then reviewed by ARHAI.

"With regard to the young patient who sadly died and who was mentioned today, for reasons of patient confidentiality, we cannot comment on the individual circumstances of this or any case.

"However, we would encourage patients or relatives who have any concerns about any aspect or their or their loved one’s care to come forward and speak to one of our clinicians.

"We are reaching out to the family mentioned by Mr Sarwar to offer them support and to discuss any issues they would like to raise."

Earlier in the session, Scottish Conservative leader Douglas Ross raised the confusion over booster jabs after eligible patients with appointments were turned away from vaccination centres.

The First Minister apologised for a “glitch” in the system but said only a small number of people had been affected. 

She said it took time for the protocols to be updated, but everything should be in place now, and those who were turned away should rebook their appointments 

Ross pointed out that at the time of his question, five health boards were implementing the guidance, five were saying they planned to implement the new guidance soon, and four health boards were yet to provide an update at all. He said patients were still being turned away.