In the Nordic countries – Norway, Sweden, Finland, Denmark and Iceland – the rate of stillbirths and deaths of babies within 28 days is 4.3 per 1 000 live births. This is the lowest in the world. In the USA, it’s about 10. The Scottish figure has now fallen to just 4.72 with the rate for the UK at 5.61.
This good news is from the BBC website! If you can bear to watch Reporting Scotland or listen to Good Morning Scotland and they mention it or don’t, let me know.
However, there’s something a bit contradictory here isn’t there. Aren’t we the sick man of Europe with shorter life expectancies due to smoking and poor diets? Shouldn’t our childbirth figures be higher than the rest of the UK? Yet, they’re not. Why? Well, I’ve already reported on what are probably the two main reasons – lower child poverty and a better NHS. Here’s a reminder of the evidence for these claims and their sources. First on child poverty, see this again:
‘Scotland, for example, has the smallest number of children living in poverty among the constituent nations of the UK, the lowest prevalence of low pay and far more young people from deprived areas going on to higher education.’ (iv)
Second on NHS Scotland:
‘Out of all the four nations, hospitals in Scotland seem [seem?] to have fared the best. Weekly data shows four-hour performance in major units hovering around the 90% mark during January.
So, who gets the credit for this? Have years of progressive social policies implemented by the SNP helped in anyway do you think? Are the UK figures lagging due to Tory austerity measures?
Talking-up Scotland 
Haha! What a fantastic photo! I just took a peek at your blog to see if there was anything for a friday afternoon cheer-up, (doom gloom), so thank you for providing 🙂
People. I really wonder at them. I mean, there was a pro-indy person this morning saying What a Mess the SNP are making of Things. What things? asks I. Well, those farm payments (roll of eyes), says he. I mean, really? A political party that happens to be in (scot)government at the moment is Not Being Perfect and Not Getting Everything Exactly Right, welll, you might as well give up the idea of independence, it would be pointless unless every single person in scotland was absolutely perfect and got everything right all the time and knew everything already and your political parties and politicians were like robots with no faults. (for context, the conversation started with ‘will nicola sturgeon call off the referendum?’). The SNP are a political party, not saints, they are trying harder than the rest of them and do better than the rest of them, so a fair number of things need sorted and can be improved upon – most of these are better sorted within an independent state, of course – so why is it that each weak moment, or tiny slip of decorum, or minor lapse of the SNP, is treated like it is disaster and we should give up now and bury our heads in the peat?
‘A total mess of things’ implies absolute chaos, a bit like the Tory UK gov’t, not ‘they still haven’t sorted the IT issue’. You know, SNP haven’t been taken to court and been found guilty of bringing in inhuman policies. The UK gov’t keeps half the money for farmers grants anyway. And why do people keep connecting constitutional issues to day to day issues? We need the SNP in a position to allow people a choice in the future, are they doing so badly at running things that we would be better off with Kezia or Ruth? I doubt Kezia even knows how to spell economy. Where do the high expectations come from for the SNP, to make people so very unhappy with their performance? The media I guess, the propaganda has been ramped up, and the hate rhetoric and lies from other politicians is getting well out of order (Kezia has been told off in parliament for saying that NS was a liar, and she was skating close to the water yesterday in FMQs as well, she presents frustratingly blind repetition just to get the accusations into the public’s minds). It is worrying that even those that are aware of of the propaganda and bias in the media react just the same to it.
Sorry about the rant! It isn’t really very relevant to the article either… but I really do not like hypocrisy, so if you expect the SNP to be perfect, then you should expect it of all other political parties, including the one making an arse of Brexit negotiations – which does not happen. Perspective is needed.
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Good rant, well-deserving targets too
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As for allegedly pro-Indy folks attacking the SNP. Ah hae ma doots!
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Yep, quite. I did feel SO much better after that rant, very cathartic, and I kinda knew you’d let me away with 🙂 – and that shocked-baby photo still makes me smile.
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Didn’t hear anything about infant mortality on BBC Radio Scotland ,. . . But KayE was back wound up to rubbish Nicola’s baby boxes. Only the callers and testers wouldn’t let her. . . At some point someone whispered in her ear that there was a mountain of texts supporting the Baby Boxes , all of a sudden KayE softened, her attitude changed as if switch had been pressed. Live to rubbish the SNP another day
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