Chamber and committees

I refer the member to the answer to S5W-22808 on 7 May 2019. All answers to written parliamentary questions are available on the Parliament's website, the search facility for which can be found at http://www.parliament.scot/parliamentarybusiness/28877.aspx .

I refer the member to the answer to S5W-22808 on 7 May 2019. All answers to written parliamentary questions are available on the Parliament's website, the search facility for which can be found at http://www.parliament.scot/parliamentarybusiness/28877.aspx .

I refer the member to the answer to S5W-22808 on 7 May 2019. All answers to written parliamentary questions are available on the Parliament's website, the search facility for which can be found at http://www.parliament.scot/parliamentarybusiness/28877.aspx .

The Scottish Health Survey provides a breakdown of the prevalence of obesity at Scotland level for adults and children by age and gender.

Adult obesity by gender in each of the last five calendar years is available here:

https://www.gov.scot/publications/scottish-health-survey-2017-volume-1-main-report/pages/98/

Adults obesity by age is available in the reports for each year. The 2017 breakdown is available here https://www.gov.scot/publications/scottish-health-Children time sersurvey-2017-volume-1-main-report/pages/99/

Child obesity by gender for each year is available here:

https://www.gov.scot/publications/scottish-health-survey-2017-volume-1-main-report/pages/100/

Child obesity by age is available in the reports for each year. The 2017 breakdown is available here:

https://www.gov.scot/publications/scottish-health-survey-2017-volume-1-main-report/pages/101/

The Scottish Health Survey also provides prevalence of obesity for adults by gender for each NHS Board, using four years of data combined:

https://www.gov.scot/publications/scottish-health-survey-results-local-areas-2014-2015-2016-2017/pages/3/

The sample size of the Scottish Health Survey is not sufficient to provide a breakdown of child obesity by NHS Board.

Data showing the proportion of children in P1 (aged 4 ½ - 6 ¼) at risk of obesity in each NHS board area, in each of the last five calendar years, is available in the Body Mass Index of Primary 1 Children in Scotland dashboard. This is broken down by gender in the ‘how does BMI vary by sex?’ tab:

https://www.isdscotland.org/Health-Topics/Child-Health/Publications/2018-12-11/visualisation.asp

In July 2018, the Scottish Government published A Healthier Future: Scotland’s Diet & Healthy Weight Delivery Plan . Our ambition is to halve childhood obesity by 2030, and significantly reduce diet-related health inequalities. We undertook wide consultation with stakeholders in developing the plan, and had numerous discussions with ministers and officials that have informed our proposals.

The Scottish Government has funded access to free sanitary products in schools, colleges and universities since August 2018 and as yet we do not yet have a complete data set.

Based on available data from 20 (out of 24) colleges in Scotland, 856,550 sanitary products were purchased by colleges between September 2018 and February 2019.

And available data from 17 (out of 18) universities in Scotland shows 1,756,618 sanitary products were purchased by universities between September 2018 and February 2019.

With reference to schools, we do not yet have confirmed data from local authorities.

Provision of free sanitary products in hospitals is a matter for NHS Scotland Health Boards and we do not hold data on this centrally.

The Scottish Government wants everyone in Scotland, no matter where they live, to eat well and have a healthy weight. That is why reducing diet-related health inequalities is a primary objective of our Diet and Healthy Weight Delivery Plan.

This will be achieved through a broad range of action focussed on prevention and early intervention. This includes population level interventions, such as restricting the promotion of junk food, which will support everyone in Scotland to make healthier choices, and through targeted and tailored support specifically to those individuals, children and families who need it most.

We must also tackle root causes of poverty and inequality. Since they are symptomatic of wider social inequalities, we are taking decisive action on a number of fronts. That includes action to end poverty, support fair wages, help families, and improve our physical and social environments. We also invested over £125m in 2018-19 on welfare mitigation and measures to protect those on low incomes in the face of UK Government’s cuts. And we are establishing Public Health Scotland which will take a leading role in tackling health inequalities.

Scotland’s Baby Boxes began distribution on 15 August 2017.

In the first full year (15 August 2017 to 15 August 2018) we distributed 52,065 Baby Boxes.

The total distributed up to 5 April 2019 is 83,199 Baby Boxes.

In terms of uptake rates, this is difficult to calculate as APS (the Baby Box Delivery Agent) only collects data on expected due date (since the boxes are delivered 4-6 weeks prior to the due date) but not the actual birth dates. The following table shows Baby Box registrations with babies due within each quarter compared to NRS recorded birth figures within each quarter. In the absence of actual date of birth, we consider due date registration data to provide the best figures to use to analyse take up. It can however only provide an indication of take up and should be treated as an indicative figure only.

The Scottish Government published guidance relating to the new ultra-orphan pathway on 30 April 2019. It can be viewed at the following link: https://www.sehd.scot.nhs.uk/details.asp?PublicationID=6485 .

The Scottish Government published guidance relating to the new ultra-orphan pathway on 30 April 2019. It can be viewed at the following link: https://www.sehd.scot.nhs.uk/details.asp?PublicationID=6485 .