Official Report 873KB pdf
The final item of business is a members’ business debate on motion S7M-00100, in the name of Patricia Gibson, on world pre-eclampsia day, 22 May 2026. The debate will be concluded without any question being put.
I call Patricia Gibson to open the debate.
Motion debated,
That the Parliament is aware that 22 May is World Pre-Eclampsia Day; notes that pre-eclampsia is a global issue, with most deaths from this condition occurring in low-income countries; is alarmed that an estimated 76,000 mothers and 500,000 babies worldwide lose their lives to pre-eclampsia and related hypertensive disorders of pregnancy every year; appreciates that 60% of hypertension-related maternal deaths are potentially preventable but there continue to be missed opportunities for appropriate, recommended care of severe maternal hypertension; understands that women who develop pre-eclampsia in pregnancy have an increased lifelong risk of some serious longer-term health conditions, including cardiovascular issues, kidney problems, diabetes and deep vein thrombosis; laments concerns that women across the UK do not currently receive long-term monitoring following pre-eclampsia in pregnancy and are often not aware of, or informed of, the long-term health risks associated with pre-eclampsia; welcomes the Scottish Government’s commitment to greater support for women who have experienced pre-eclampsia in Phase Two of its Women’s Health Plan, which was published in January 2026, and applauds the work of the charity, Action on Pre-Eclampsia, which is dedicated to raising awareness, improving care and supporting individuals affected by pre-eclampsia.
18:08
Presiding Officer—[Inaudible.]
Sorry—you have not got your card in your console. Can you start again, please?
My apologies, Presiding Officer.
I am delighted to have secured the very first members’ business debate in this session of Parliament, and I thank all members who supported my motion to make it possible.
May was national pre-eclampsia awareness month, and 22 May was world pre-eclampsia day. I believe that it is right and fitting that there is global recognition of this important maternal health issue. Pre-eclampsia is a condition that develops during pregnancy or shortly after birth and is characterised by high blood pressure and protein in the urine. It can affect the heart, liver, lungs, kidneys and brain, and it can cause blood clotting and lead to eclampsia, which is life threatening and involves seizures.
The World Health Organization estimates that pre-eclampsia affects between 3 and 8 per cent of women worldwide. A study that the WHO conducted only last year found that hypertensive disorders in pregnancy, including pre-eclampsia, are responsible for 16 per cent of maternal deaths globally.
Around 76,000 women and 500,000 babies die worldwide each year from eclampsia. While I welcome the focus that world pre-eclampsia day brings to this important issue, I believe that, given the stark figures that I have cited, pre-eclampsia should receive much more focus than it currently does.
I pay tribute to the work of Action on Pre-eclampsia, which is a United Kingdom charity that works to raise awareness of this life-threatening condition. As a first step, expectant mums should be aware of the symptoms of pre-eclampsia, as being aware could save their life and the life of their baby. Suffering during pregnancy from headaches, high blood pressure, blurry vision, upper right pain in the tummy, swelling and shortness of breath are all classic signs. More work needs to be done to ensure that pregnant women are provided with that information so that any symptoms can be investigated and addressed at the earliest opportunity.
Women who are at risk could, and should, benefit from preventative measures such as low-dose aspirin by 20 weeks or when antenatal care begins; calcium supplementation in settings with low dietary intake; and treatment of any pre-existing high blood pressure or associated conditions. Sadly, the picture is not what it needs to be in Scotland or across the UK, where it is estimated that 10 per cent of pregnancies are impacted by hypertensive disorders, including pre-eclampsia.
Specific data on the number of women in Scotland or the UK who are impacted is—astonishingly—not publicly available. Perhaps the Minister for Mental Wellbeing, Public Health, Sport, Alcohol and Drugs can tell us why that is. The information is held at national health service board level, and freedom of information requests would bring it into the public domain, but that should happen already. Unless that information is collated, a proper and robust strategy to track the long-term health of women who suffer from pre-eclampsia, and who may face serious health risks as a direct consequence, cannot be undertaken effectively. I therefore urge the minister to ensure that specific data on the number of women in Scotland who are impacted by pre-eclampsia is made publicly available.
According to Action on Pre-eclampsia, more than 5,000 pregnant women in the UK each year suffer from pre-eclampsia and 1,000 babies die from causes related to it. The lifelong health implications for those women are serious and potentially fatal, because they will have a fivefold increased risk of hypertension; three times the probability of a stroke; twice the risk of cardiovascular mortality; and a fourfold risk of suffering a major adverse cardiovascular event. In addition, such women have an increased risk of diabetes, kidney disease, liver disease and thrombosis.
We do not know whether pre-eclampsia causes those increased lifelong risks, or whether pre-eclampsia is caused by underlying conditions that elevate a woman’s likelihood of developing cardiovascular and other issues. We know, however, that women in Scotland—despite those extremely serious lifelong and life-threatening risks—have no long-term monitoring following pre-eclampsia in pregnancy.
The NHS Scotland website highlights potential long-term risks, but that falls very far short of what is required to address them. I understand that, in March, the Scottish Government indicated that women who have had pre-eclampsia would receive annual health reviews and long-term blood pressure monitoring as part of the Scottish cardiovascular disease risk factors programme. I welcome that, and I ask the minister what the timeline for the implementation of monitoring is. I am also keen to know whether that monitoring will be retrospective in order to include women who suffered from pre-eclampsia in years gone by, given that the health risks are lifelong.
I ask that because I suffered a stillbirth at full term in 2009 after developing HELLP—haemolysis, elevated liver enzymes and low platelets—syndrome, which is a very extreme form of pre-eclampsia and which, along with the mismanagement of my treatment, killed my son and very nearly killed me. After spending 10 days in intensive care and recovering for a further nine days in high dependency, I was discharged. No one, at any time, mentioned to me that I faced long-term serious health risks; it was not even touched on. Members can imagine my upset and anger when I discovered that purely by accident.
I am sure that many women have been impacted by pre-eclampsia with no, or very little, idea of the extremely serious health risks to which they have been exposed, and that is truly shocking. The minister is clearly not responsible if some clinicians do not make their patients aware of very important health risks that they face, but I ask her what she can do to ensure that clinicians share important medical information about health risks and to ensure that that falls under the statutory rights of patients.
The reality is simply that women who are impacted by pre-eclampsia are not always provided with that vital information, and that cannot be right. I know that good work on the issue is taking place in NHS Lothian, but the need is urgent across Scotland, including in my own Cunninghame South constituency.
I have spoken about the symptoms of pre-eclampsia and how pregnant women should be informed of them. When those symptoms appear, women do not always realise the danger that they and their babies might be in. Ensuring that expectant mums recognise the symptoms is important, but it is also vital that, when they present with symptoms, they are not dismissed and fobbed off, as I was. Half of all stillbirths occur after women present with concerns and are shooed away and told not to worry. Had I been listened to, my baby would not have died, my liver would not have ruptured and my husband would probably not have had to be asked to come to the hospital to bid me farewell because clinicians thought that I was going to die.
Will the minister work with the NHS to ensure that women, as a right, are better informed about pre-eclampsia symptoms as part of their antenatal care; are provided with vital information about the lifelong risks to their health following a birth that was impacted by pre-eclampsia; and receive lifelong monitoring of their health, particularly cardiovascular health, following pre-eclampsia? It would be good if that monitoring could include women who suffered pre-eclampsia in past years and who still face greater risks to their health.
Finally, will the minister work with health boards to centrally collect and collate data on the incidence of pre-eclampsia? That will enable a proper and robust strategy to track the long-term health of women who have suffered from pre-eclampsia. Such actions would do much to reassure me, and all women who face serious long-term health risks to which pre-eclampsia has given rise, that women’s health is an absolute priority for the Scottish Government.
We move to the open debate, with speeches of around four minutes.
18:16
I thank Patricia Gibson for securing time through the first members’ business debate of this session to raise awareness of pre-eclampsia. I think that I speak for all of us when I say that her speech was powerful, moving and commanding.
We know that the disorder affects up to one in 25 pregnancies in the UK. I was delivered into this world via an emergency caesarean section, as my mum suffered from severe eclampsia. With her permission, I want to share her story this evening, to underline the seriousness of the disorder for mothers during pregnancy and in the years beyond.
My mother went from under 9 stone to 17 stone over the course of her pregnancy. As she was a 24-year-old woman, general practitioners dismissed her weight gain until she was unable to move her fingers. Her skin broke because of huge fluid retention.
For the last eight weeks of her pregnancy with me, my mother was hospitalised with eclampsia. After two failed inductions, she began to fit and seizure during the third. Doctors explained to my dad that the lives of his wife and his unborn child were at risk. Once I was delivered and the placenta was removed, the symptoms waned, and we are both here today. However, the impact on her physical and mental health has been felt for years.
In 1995, when I was born, post-traumatic stress disorder therapy and postpartum psychology were in their infancy. Six months after I was born, my mum became pregnant again, and she was medically advised to terminate the pregnancy. Another two miscarriages followed, with two major surgeries to resolve adhesions and internal hernias caused by eclampsia. There was no continuous support throughout all of that. The strain on her body and mind was and continues to be significant, and her story, while distressing, is not uncommon or unique.
I accept that, today, early diagnosis of symptoms has improved, and so, too, has post-pregnancy mental health support. However, Patricia Gibson’s motion makes it clear that women still do not receive the long-term monitoring that they deserve, and, in many cases, are not aware of the symptoms of pre-eclampsia.
The post-pregnancy support does not yet go far enough, but the Scottish Government is aware of that. I know that it is working to change that reality for women, and I look forward to hearing the contribution from Maree Todd about how the Scottish Government will look to improve the support through phase 2 of the women’s health plan.
In closing, I again thank Patricia Gibson for bringing this important discussion to the chamber.
18:20
I start by welcoming Patricia Gibson to the Parliament and thanking her for bringing this important issue to the chamber as the subject of the first members’ business debate of the session. I also thank her for her passionate and personal speech. As it is the first members’ business debate of the session, I think that it should have a special place in what we do over the coming years. I do not believe that we debated pre-eclampsia in the previous session, so I welcome the opportunity to do so today.
As others have said, world pre-eclampsia day takes place annually, this year on 22 May, to raise global awareness about this life-threatening hypertensive disorder of pregnancy. The motion rightly notes that pre-eclampsia is a global issue, with most deaths from the condition occurring in low-income countries. As Patricia Gibson said, 76,000 mothers and 500,000 babies worldwide lose their lives to pre-eclampsia and related hypertensive disorders of pregnancy every year. We know that a large number of those deaths could be preventable with the provision of correct care and medicine. I agree whole-heartedly that this is a really important issue.
The provision of correct care starts with knowing about the symptoms, and the focus of the campaign for 2026 is on educating mothers, their wider family and healthcare professionals on how to identify warning signs such as severe headaches and sudden swelling. Early screening, diagnosis and treatment are key to outcomes for mother and baby, and it is important that mothers continue to monitor their health while they are pregnant. I agree that it is important that we try to change healthcare for mothers.
The key symptoms are worth repeating: high blood pressure, severe headaches, sudden swelling in hands, face and feet, blurred vision and sudden weight gain. Maternity services should make women aware of those symptoms whenever they can.
I mentioned that we did not debate the issue in the previous session. However, much work was undertaken by many members, including some of our colleagues who have not returned to the Parliament. In that regard, I want to mention Monica Lennon, who is my Scottish Labour colleague and who was an MSP for Central Scotland. As members know, Monica Lennon was a real champion for women across Scotland and beyond. She chaired the cross-party group on women’s health and we can all agree that her pioneering and successful Period Products (Free Provision) (Scotland) Act 2021 changed menstrual health for women across the world. She had a very collaborative way of campaigning with other members and with families and people who had experienced women’s health issues. I hope that we can continue in that spirit in this first members’ business debate of the session and onwards.
Monica Lennon campaigned with others on pre-eclampsia to make changes in Scotland to ensure that pregnancy is safer, and the Scottish Government’s announcement of dedicated funding for pre-eclampsia testing, for the first time ever, was warmly welcomed. It is now being used in every health board, and it really protects mothers and babies. Given what we have heard in speeches today, we can see that such testing is important, and the funding for it came about through the collaboration of MSPs and campaigners. Therefore, this seems the right time to thank Monica for all the work that she did across parties and with many activists from her region and beyond. As I have said, I hope that, in this session, we will take advantage of the ability of women to work together on women’s health, as we have done successfully in the past.
I hope that the minister will address the removal of the specific post of minister with responsibility for women’s health and speak to how we can ensure that members can communicate as well as we did with Jenni Minto, who held that role and worked in a collaborative way. I note that, in true Monica Lennon style, she has tweeted this afternoon to ask whether we can have some guidance on the role of the women’s health champion, which was a really important part of that collaborative working.
I thank Patricia Gibson for all her work on the issue and members for speaking in the debate. I hope that we do further work on it in the coming session.
18:24
I thank Patricia Gibson for securing the motion for the first members’ business debate and welcome the chance to speak about such an important issue. I take the opportunity to thank the Geddes family from the West Scotland region that I represent. They lost their son, Clark, early in 2021 after he was born too soon because his mother, Ami, became life-threateningly ill with pre-eclampsia.
Clark’s parents, Ami and Stuart Geddes, teamed up with Action on Pre-Eclampsia, which Patricia Gibson has mentioned, to launch Clark’s campaign. Named for their son, the campaign asks for pregnant people in Scotland to be able to access placental growth factor testing: a blood test that has been available in England since 2016. Happily, Clark’s campaign was successful, with the Scottish Government agreeing to provide funding for placental growth factor testing to pregnant people across Scotland. That should now be available all across Scotland and could mean that pre-eclampsia is diagnosed more swiftly, which will enable people to get the right help when they need it.
As Patricia Gibson has said, the most common signs that pregnant people may have pre-eclampsia are protein in their urine and high blood pressure, which is what health professionals check for at regular checks throughout pregnancy. Placental growth factor testing may be used if someone is at higher risk, has high blood pressure or protein in their urine.
I thank Clark’s parents for campaigning to help other parents avoid the horrific loss that they endured. To quote Margaret Mead:
“Never doubt that a small group of thoughtful, committed citizens can change the world; indeed, it’s the only thing that ever has.”
18:27
I start by paying tribute to Patricia Gibson for securing the motion for debate and for campaigning on the issue over many years. In 2019, when she was a member of the House of Commons, she secured the first-ever debate in the Parliament on pre-eclampsia. As the Conservative Party health spokesperson at the time, I saw the debate and wanted to ensure that we had the opportunity to debate pre-eclampsia in the chamber. The following year, in March 2020, I secured a members’ debate in Conservative Party time.
I put on record that I do not feel that we have necessarily made the progress that we all want to see. In 2016, the National Institute for Health and Care Excellence recommended that testing should be made available. I welcome the fact that health boards in Scotland, including my health board in Lothian and NHS Fife—which I think was the first to do this—have implemented the testing from 2024 for pregnant woman who are at increased risk of pre-eclampsia. However, I do not think that we are capturing everybody, and, in considering the asks that the member has put to the minister, we need to understand that. We must ensure that the testing captures those who are in their first pregnancies in particular.
Nonetheless, I welcome some of the positive progress that has been made by the Government. We need to continue to campaign on the issue and I very much welcome the fact that this is the first members’ business debate of the parliamentary session.
I pay tribute to the Presiding Officer. Throughout his time as an MSP, he has also advocated for more action and has spoken in every one of the members’ debates on the issue in the Parliament. It is important to put that on record. I pay tribute to and thank Jack Middleton for sharing his personal and family stories. Every new MSP has the opportunity to bring their personal stories to the chamber to ensure that we bring to life the campaigns and issues that we need to act on collectively.
The testing that I have mentioned is welcome. It is taking forward early intervention and I hope that it will provide the opportunity to put in place a preventative pathway for pregnant woman. However, clearly, the aftercare is not being delivered. I am concerned about the many tales and stories that I have heard of individuals who have had a test and got care, but have then not been provided with that lifelong care—after they have had a successful pregnancy, the NHS decides that that is it. People go home, celebrate their baby and get on with life, but the aftercare and the future impact of pre-eclampsia on people’s health is not being taken seriously and the necessary future testing is not being put in place. I did not have time to check, but I do not think that the Patient Safety Commissioner for Scotland has done any work on or made recommendations on what such lifelong care should look like. It has taken 10 years for the NHS to get to a place where it is willing to test for pre-eclampsia. Delivering the aftercare for life that individuals will need following pre-eclampsia should be the subject of the next campaign and is something that we should all strive for.
We must return to the issue of health inequalities. From speaking to constituents, I know that the ability to access testing and other health services continues to be a postcode lottery. I pay tribute to Action on Pre-eclampsia. I printed off its debate briefing from 2020. At that point, APEC wanted to see an end to the postcode lottery when it came to testing, whereby women in Scotland were being unfairly and inequitably deprived of a test that could be life saving. I am concerned that, now, women and babies across Scotland are fighting to access the aftercare.
This debate is very welcome, but it is not the end in any way. We need to address the aftercare of affected women in Scotland. I hope that the debate is just the start of our work to ensure that such aftercare is delivered during this parliamentary session.
18:31
I thank Patricia Gibson for bringing this important debate to the chamber and for raising awareness of pre-eclampsia. I also thank her for her powerful testimony, and I thank members across the chamber for their testimony.
Listening to those accounts and the issues that have been raised today takes me back to the birth of my own little boy three years ago. I am reminded of what an incredible time it was for me and my wife as we welcomed our first child into the world. I also remember how vulnerable my wife was in those final stages of pregnancy. Alongside all the practical questions that soon-to-be parents have to consider—some of which are lovely, such as deciding what colour to paint the new arrival’s bedroom and what name to choose, among all the excitement that comes with preparing for a new baby—there are also important health considerations that require a lot of thought and planning. During pregnancy, parents are often given a huge amount of information to take in, and it can be difficult to know what to look out for and what to prioritise.
I am conscious that I am speaking in today’s debate as someone who will never experience pregnancy personally, but I remember very well how important it was for me to have the right information and understanding so that I could speak up for my wife when she was not in a position to do so herself, particularly in those final stages of pregnancy and during labour.
As we have heard this afternoon and as set out in the motion, 76,000 mothers and 500 babies worldwide lose their lives due to pre-eclampsia and related conditions every single year. What I found to be most striking is that 60 per cent of those maternal deaths could be prevented. We know that signs of pre-eclampsia, as we have heard today, can be easily missed. Symptoms such as swelling of the face, hands and feet, or pain below the ribs, can easily be mistaken for routine parts of pregnancy.
The theme of this year’s world pre-eclampsia day—know her symptoms—feels very apt. We need to equip expectant mothers, as well as their partners and loved ones who are supporting them, with the right information so that they can ask the right questions, raise concerns and advocate for themselves at all stages of pregnancy and afterwards.
That responsibility does not end at birth. As we have heard, the years afterwards are just as important in protecting mothers’ long-term health. We need to ensure that women receive long-term monitoring following pre-eclampsia in pregnancy to guard against those long-term risks. I was shocked to hear that, following her experiences, Patricia Gibson was not even made aware of those long-term risks. We need to look at that issue.
Far too often, women are not taken seriously when they raise medical concerns. Unfortunately, that is often the case during pregnancy and more generally, and that needs to be tackled.
I am pleased that, as part of the women’s health plan, the Scottish Government is committed to greater support for women who have experienced pre-eclampsia, but we need to ensure that those commitments are carried out. I agree with Patricia Gibson that we need to make publicly available the data on women who are impacted. That is vital and is a key issue that should come out of the debate. Raising awareness will save lives, as will ensuring that women are listened to.
I call Maree Todd to wind up the debate on behalf of the Scottish Government.
18:35
I welcome the opportunity to mark world pre-eclampsia day, which was held on 22 May. It is an important moment that reminds us of not only the scale of the condition globally but our responsibility in Scotland to lead with compassion, evidence and action.
I am very grateful to Patricia Gibson for raising the issue and I will start by saying how sorry I am for her loss. There have been powerful personal testimonies from both Patricia Gibson from the mother’s perspective and Jack Middleton from the child’s perspective. All politics is personal and we are at our most powerful when we use our personal experiences to advocate for change.
Pre-eclampsia is a serious pregnancy-specific condition that can, typically, arise after 20 weeks of pregnancy. It happens when the placenta does not work as well as it should, leading to high blood pressure and in some cases affecting different organs in the body, as we have heard. Globally, as others have said, the picture is stark. Every year, an estimated 76,000 mothers and 500,000 babies lose their lives due to pre-eclampsia and related hypertensive conditions in pregnancy. The vast majority of those tragedies occur in low-income countries and are potentially preventable. That tells us that, in many cases, the difference between life and death is timely recognition, appropriate escalation and access to high-quality care.
Here in Scotland, maternal safety is a national priority. We maintain robust, evidence-based systems for the early detection and management of pre-eclampsia. The best start programme and the work of the maternity and neonatal safety collaborative continue to ensure early recognition of risk, consistent escalation of care and equitable access to high-quality antenatal services for all women across all parts of Scotland. However, I am certainly willing to link in with Public Health Scotland, as Patricia Gibson requested, to determine how the data that she referred to could be collected and reported.
Routine antenatal surveillance remains our first line of defence. Women are invited to attend regular midwife appointments, at which a routine review of symptoms and an assessment of blood pressure and urine is completed for all.
In 2024, the First Minister met families who had suffered the devastating loss of their babies as a result of pre-eclampsia. Together with the organisation Action on Pre-eclampsia, those families put forward the case for improved testing to prevent tragic cases such as theirs from occurring again. I am pleased to note that, since that work was established, all women in Scotland now have access to enhanced testing, which is known as placental growth factor—PlFG—testing.
We are also continuing to strengthen our systems. We are developing an updated national maternity early warning score—MEWS—to support the earlier identification of patients whose condition is deteriorating, including those with high blood pressure, and rapid and appropriate escalation to ensure that women receive the right care and treatment as quickly as possible.
We have developed new pathways, which are designed not only to improve immediate outcomes but to address the longer-term impacts of the condition and reduce the longer-term maternal risk of cardiovascular disease, in line with the Scottish Government’s ambition to improve population health.
Over recent years, our understanding of pre-eclampsia has evolved. We now know that it is not just a complication of pregnancy but a marker of future health risk. Women who experience in pregnancy hypertensive disorders such as high blood pressure, gestational diabetes and pre-eclampsia have an increased lifetime risk of cardiovascular disease, stroke and diabetes, and an increased risk of premature death.
I am pleased to inform members that a short-life working group is focusing on reducing cardiovascular risk in women who experience high blood pressure in pregnancy. In 2025, that group developed a national pathway to reduce long-term cardiovascular risk. The pathway represents a significant step forward in how we support women, not just during pregnancy but across their entire life course.
Today, I met a constituent who told me that, when they were pregnant, they were given their medical records to take to meetings, because no digitalised records of such conditions were kept. One of my biggest concerns is that, in a successful pregnancy, the health of the baby is the key concern of all involved, but what work is the Government undertaking to ensure that women are aware of future health implications? Many people are not aware of the future health implications and still see pre-eclampsia as a condition that affects only the period before, during and after birth.
The pathway is clear in its intent. We want to identify women with cardiovascular risk who can be treated early. Such women are provided with a home blood pressure monitor in the period immediately after giving birth and are supported through remote monitoring via an online platform and by their primary care team. There is a strong communication process. Crucially, the follow-up is structured and sustained. Such women are reviewed at six weeks after birth, as normal, again at four months, and then annually thereafter for life. Therefore, it should be perfectly possible to identify such women prospectively and to ensure that they are provided with good care.
The issue of retrospective identification is one that I will take back to officials to find out what we are doing to retrospectively identify middle-aged women like me who had pre-eclampsia many years ago, when the system was not in place.
The pathway will ensure that the window of opportunity that is presented by pregnancy is not lost. It will enable us to provide not only reactive care but proactive prevention, which is what we are after in Scotland. We are currently testing the pathway in NHS Lothian, supported by funding from the British Heart Foundation, and we are committed to evaluating its impact robustly. That is exactly the kind of innovation that ensures the provision of joined-up, person-centred care that is focused on long-term outcomes. There are many points in a woman’s life at which there are important opportunities to identify cardiovascular risk, but pregnancy absolutely remains a key opportunity for intervention.
The health of women and girls is a clear priority for this Government and for me, and I want to ensure that women and girls in Scotland experience the best possible health throughout their lives. I am proud that Scotland was the first country in the UK to deliver a women’s health plan. Women’s heart health has been a clear priority in the plan from day 1, and that focus has continued into the plan’s second phase, which was published in January 2026. Phase 2 of the women’s health plan has a renewed focus on optimising future health. It sets out the action that we will take from preconception and throughout the course of women’s lives.
Let me make it clear to Monica Lennon, for whom I have a great deal of fondness and respect, that I have responsibility for women’s health. That is a responsibility that I am delighted to have, and on which I am keen to continue Jenni Minto’s good, collaborative work. Anna Glasier is currently still the women’s health champion, and phase 2 of the women’s health plan notes that the role will continue, so it is crystal clear that women’s health is still a very high priority for this Government.
Many women in Scotland are affected by the long-term health risks associated with pre-eclampsia. That is why we have prioritised action to ensure that women who experience hypertensive disorders of pregnancy are informed about their lifetime CVD risk and are provided with opportunities to reduce that risk. The invaluable work of third sector agencies such as Action on Pre-eclampsia ensures that we continue to raise awareness and drive improvements in care, and I am very happy to place on record our appreciation for their ongoing work.
I finish by acknowledging the profound impacts that pre-eclampsia can have on women and families in Scotland. We know that, without early detection and management, women and their babies are placed at significant risk. No opportunity to prevent harm should be missed. Every woman deserves the highest standards of care, wherever she lives.
Meeting closed at 18:45.
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