Child Cancer Services Saved After Campaign
Children’s cancer services are to be kept in all four of Scotland’s main cities.
Health secretary Nicola Sturgeon said the services – at Edinburgh, Glasgow, Dundee and Aberdeen – will not not be downgraded “in any way”.
She said an extra £32m is to be spent on a national plan for providing specialist services for children.
Her announcement ends months of uncertainty over a review of child cancer services after The Herald revealed the results of a review into centralisation.
Options that had been floated included withdrawing some aspects of diagnosis, treatment, research and training from Aberdeen and Edinburgh and concentrating them in Glasgow.
Another option would have downgraded Aberdeen, which would cease treatment of brain tumours and some drugs trials, while Glasgow and Edinburgh would operate as national centres.
Ms Sturgeon said today’s announcement marked the start of a period of stability.
“I realise there has been a great deal of uncertainty over children’s cancer services in Scotland and I can now remove any doubts and allay the concerns of staff, patients and families,” she said.
“There is no recommendation to remove children’s cancer services from any of the sites where it is provided and I can confirm today that none of the four units will be downgraded in any way.
“I am delighted to announce that the service will be delivered as a network across the four sites in Scotland.”
Ms Sturgeon’s announcement came when she responded to the report of a national steering group on specialist services for children.
She said that operating a national services across the four existing hospitals would promote a “uniformity of care” that did not at present exist, and ensure that care was provided as close to home as possible.
“I very much support recommendations that a number of networks be established across the range of specialist children’s services, including cystic fibrosis, rheumatology, general surgery and inherited metabolic disease, to deliver the best possible care,” she said.
The announcement was welcomed by MSPs in the affected cities.
Shirley-Anne Somerville, SNP MSP for Lothians region, said: “The services at the Sick Kids’ are vital, not only to the Lothians, but to the wider area, and the retention of these services is fantastic news.
“It is also a vindication for the SNP’s policy of keeping health care local which exposes the mistaken route taken by the previous Labour-Lib Dem Executive who initiated this review when they were in power.”
Aberdeen North MSP Brian Adam said: “The decision is a clear victory for all those local campaigners who took their case to Parliament and made sure that the needs of the north east were heard loud and clear.
“Throughout this process the Scottish Government has taken advice from experts in the healthcare profession and the evidence in this case supported their policy of a presumption against centralising services and I am pleased that Nicola Sturgeon has reaffirmed this position today.”
