DEATHS linked to Scotland’s three biggest killers – cancer, heart disease and strokes – fell last year. The number of deaths from cancer fell for the second year running to 15,466, including 4,128 from lung cancer.

SIX Lothian social start-ups have received nearly £6 million of funding to help get their operations off the ground. The Scottish Futures Trust has awarded start-up funding to the first tranche of “hub initiatives” – public-private partnerships to create new health and social care projects.

The leader of Highland Council yesterday gave an assurance the only work being carried out on the future of council care homes is a review of the business case for building new ones.

The privatisation of every care home run by Highland Council is back on the agenda. The Press and Journal can reveal that e-mail messages exchanged by senior officials have confirmed that the controversial option has been discussed by senior members of the local authority’s administration at secret talks.

NORTH Ayrshire Council have pulled the plug on a charity who offer a befriending service to the disabled and their families.

THE newborn baby lies cradled in a nurse’s arms, looking the picture of innocence. As she sleeps, she is blissfully unaware that her mother has already left the hospital – to go to a drug rehabilitation clinic.

A sex offender disclosure pilot, which is to be rolled out across Scotland, has already protected more than a dozen children.

A project currently being piloted in Tayside, which gives parents details of sex offenders in their area, is to be rolled out throughout Scotland.

VITAL services could be lost in West Dunbartonshire if the council and health board integrate, it has been claimed. Councillor Jim Bollan expressed concerns over the plan to merge West Dunbartonshire Council and NHS Greater Glasgow and Clyde’s social work and health services.

Child protection officers in Dundee have “responded quickly” to a critical report last year, inspectors have said.