Hundreds of suicides show why Scotland must declare NHS waiting times emergency
Scotland deserves a free and fair NHS that is there for people in practice as well as in principle
In September, we mark Suicide Prevention Day, but in Scotland the reality is far from reassuring. Under the SNP’s watch, young people are waiting far too long for help.
Over June in Lothian, 126 young people had been waiting over a year without treatment from Child and Adolescent Mental Health Services, while another 246 had waited between nine months and a year. For those, a delay is not just a statistic, it is months and years lost to anxiety, families pushed to breaking point, and communities fearful of the next tragedy.
Speak to any parent who has lost a child to suicide, or to a family member or friend who has tried to navigate Scotland’s broken mental health system, and you will hear stories of fear, exhaustion and the lasting scars of a service that too often fails when it is needed most. For many young people, asking for help comes when they have reached a breaking point, and being told they must wait months or years only worsens their condition.
Sounding the alarm
The consequences of this failure are reflected in the national figures. In 2024, there were 704 probable suicides, with men making up almost three-quarters of the deaths. The figures also show a shift in age trends: the highest rates are now among people aged 25 to 44, underlining how younger adults are increasingly at risk.
Earlier this year, the scale of the crisis was highlighted by one man from West Lothian, who walked from Essex to Edinburgh to raise awareness of men’s mental health. His effort speaks to a reality that the data makes clear: individuals are sounding the alarm while our healthcare system continues to fall short.
These stories sit within a wider pattern of failure. Across Scotland, the NHS is struggling with the overwhelming demand for mental health care, not just for children and adolescents but for adults too. The aftershocks of Covid lockdowns and the cost-of-living crisis have all played their part. Yet instead of rising to the challenge, the SNP government has allowed waiting lists to spiral out of control.
£99 Covid vaccine
Mental health is only one part of a much broader NHS emergency. People living with long-term conditions such as diabetes are also being left behind. From autumn this year, free Covid vaccines will be restricted to a very limited group – the over-75s, care home residents and the immunosuppressed.
Many people with conditions like diabetes will no longer qualify, despite being more likely to suffer serious complications if they catch Covid. Instead, they are being forced to pay privately for protection, with boosters costing between £75 and £99.
This creates a two-tier system: those who qualify get free access, while those who don’t must pay out of pocket. It is a policy that undermines trust, deepens inequality and adds to the mental strain of living with a long-term condition.
Doctors have already warned the NHS in Scotland is “dying before our very eyes”, and even the SNP’s own public health minister has admitted government failings are costing lives. The scale of those failings is written in the figures.
Around 100,000 patients have already waited more than a year for treatment, and nearly 15,000 – one in every 367 people in Scotland – have been waiting over two years. In England, just 182 people, or one in 317,000, have waited more than two years, meaning Scots are 864 times more likely to do so.
Founded on fairness
Frontline staff are working under relentless pressure, with GPs warning of “unsafe” caseloads and A&E departments routinely missing waiting-time targets. For patients, this means longer queues and the erosion of the basic confidence that the NHS will be there when it is needed.
Faced with long delays, record numbers of patients are being forced to spend their savings or fall into debt to pay for private treatment when they should be able to rely on the NHS. In response, some suggest turning to insurance-style reform as the answer. But that is not reform. It is retreat. It risks creating a system where access to care depends on what you can afford, rather than what you need.
The NHS was founded on the principle of fairness, and Labour is determined to uphold that principle and rebuild a service that works for everyone. That means declaring a national waiting times emergency, delivering thousands more appointments each year, and ensuring staff have the resources they need to provide care when and where it is needed.
That principle is especially critical when it comes to mental health. September should be a time to encourage people to seek help and to break down the stigma around mental illness. But what happens after someone finds the courage to reach out? We cannot allow them to be left facing endless delays. We need a system that is ready to listen and respond. One that treats timely care as just as important as open conversations.
We owe that to every young person struggling in silence, every parent waiting anxiously for help that never comes, and every patient in pain left behind in a broken system. Scotland deserves an NHS that not only remains free and fair, but one that is there in practice as well as in principle.
The health of our nation depends on it, and we cannot afford to wait any longer. If we fail to act now, the danger is not only to health outcomes but to public faith in the very promise of universal care.
Foysol Choudhury is a Labour MSP for Lothian
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