Waiting-time at Scotland’s accident and emergency departments have been breached a staggering 11,316 times in the last two weeks.
It means more than one person every two minutes waited longer than the target of four hours at hospital emergency departments.
The week ending December 15 was the worst on record since the Scottish Government began publishing weekly updates in February 2015.
Up to December 15, a total of 5761 patients waited more than four hours. Of those, 1135 were still waiting after eight hours and 384 were stuck in casualty for more than 12 hours.
Figures for the week ending December 22, which were released yesterday, showed just 79.9 per cent of patients were seen in time. It meant 5555 waited longer – 980 waited eight hours or longer and 293 more than 12 hours.
With the exception of the previous week, only figures during the Beast of the East havoc in February 2018 were marginally worse.
Scottish chairman of the Royal College of Emergency Medicine, David Chung, warned two months ago that the NHS was facing a winter crisis. He said: “The capacity and demand match is creeping closely to where it won’t cope.
Labour’s health spokeswoman Monica Lennon said: “Scotland’s A&E departments are under enormous pressure and this is extremely worrying.
“In a fortnight alone, more than 11,000 people waited longer than four hours in A&E – that’s like the population of Largs or Stonehaven turning up and shows the scale of the challenge our NHS staff face every day. People should only attend A&E in a genuine emergency.”
Health Secretary Jeane Freeman last night thanked all NHS and social care staff who have been “working tirelessly over this festive period”.
She added: “Scotland’s core A&E departments continue to be the best performing in the UK and have been for more than four-and-a-half years even while experiencing continued high attendance levels.”
