Coronavirus: care home inspections drop by 90% during pandemic

The number of inspections completed at Scotland's care homes fell by more than 90% during the first two months of the pandemic, new figures show.

Inspectors initially stopped their physical visits amid fears their work would spread coronavirus.

Inspections that did go ahead include one at a Skye care home where 10 residents died in a Covid-19 outbreak.

Complaints about care homes have also jumped by a third since March according to the Care Inspectorate.

More people have now died with coronavirus in Scotland's 1,142 care homes than in hospital and there has been criticism of the way in which the crisis has been handled in the sector.

The Care Inspectorate said it has "rigorously monitored" homes during the pandemic and taken robust action where required, pointing out it has had nearly 20,000 contacts with services in recent months.

But Jackie Baillie, deputy leader of the Scottish Labour Party, said "it was wrong for the Care Inspectorate to take a step back and suspend inspections".

She added: "Care homes have been at the epicentre of the coronavirus outbreak and the need for the Care Inspectorate to be firing on all cylinders has been evidenced by the increase in the number of complaints."

The Care Inspectorate completed 219 inspections of care homes in April and May last year.

During April this year no inspections took place, and in May just 20 were completed.

Up to 31 May, the 300-strong band of inspectors had made 19,047 contacts with services, including video consultation and observations.

The Dundee-based public body has also revealed there were 697 complaints about care homes for older people between March and May, a 34% increase on the same period last year.

Issues about wellbeing and health care accounted for nearly half of the complaints.

A spokesman for the Care Inspectorate said its approach was informed by public health advice and agreed with the Scottish government.

He said: "The Care Inspectorate is inspecting services and will take robust action where that is required.

"The clear advice from directors of public health from the outset that carrying out visits of any kind including inspections presented a significant risk of spreading Covid-19 to many of the most vulnerable in Scotland.

"We put systems in place to be able to carry out inspections during the pandemic where the evidence deemed it to be necessary and we rigorously monitored services through gathering and sharing intelligence including the notifications we required them to submit about cases of Covid-19 and staffing levels."