NHS Recovery Plan 2021-2026: annual progress update report 2024

Introduction

Our NHS Recovery Plan 2021-26 was published in August 2021 and set out our key ambitions and actions to be delivered over 5 years in order to address the backlog in care and drive the recovery and renewal of NHS services. Since then, we have seen significant progress in supporting our health and social care systems to recover from the pandemic, and this annual report sets out what has been achieved during the course of 2024.

The worldwide Covid pandemic was a once in a generation event which had, and continues to have, a lasting impact on our health and social care services. Our plan set out the key recovery actions we would take in the immediate response to the pandemic when it was published in 2021. Many of these have now been delivered, and we remain committed to delivering on the aims of the recovery plan.

We must also recognise that the landscape has changed since the plan was published over three years ago and therefore our approach must evolve too. In many cases, newer, better ways of supporting the aspirations of the plan have been identified and implemented, particularly to meet the additional challenges which have arisen in the years since the plan was published as a consequence of the national and worldwide economic context.

Whilst the legacy of the pandemic will be felt for many years still to come, recovery from its impacts alone are not sufficient. We must also increasingly look ahead to ensure that our health and social care services undergo reform to ensure that they meet the future needs of the people of Scotland. Even before the pandemic, it was clear that our health and social care services, in line with those of many countries, faced challenges from demographic change and forecast deterioration in population health which meant that even without the impact of the pandemic, innovation and change in how we deliver these services would have been necessary.

In June 2024, Cabinet Secretary for Health and Social Care set out our commitment to not only recover our health and social care services, but to reform them to support improved wellbeing of people across Scotland and secure the sustainability of our services for the future. This builds on the strategic foundations developed over the past decade or so, particularly our 2016 National Clinical Strategy which set the Scottish Government’s strategic intent for NHS Scotland for the 15 years following its publication.

This underpins our ongoing commitment, via both recovery and reform, to enable people to live longer, healthier and more fulfilling lives, and is supported by the four key areas of place-based population health improvement; early intervention and prevention; improved access; and high quality service provision; all with people at the heart of our decision making.

This programme of reform has fundamentally shaped how we have taken forward the actions set out in the NHS Recovery Plan throughout 2024, forming a bridge between the necessary actions that were required in response to the immediate impact of the pandemic whilst laying the foundations for ongoing reform.

As the NHS Recovery Plan proceeds towards the completion date in 2026, the focus of actions being taken associated with it will increasingly be reform as much as recovery.

This shifting balance does not mean we are any less committed to delivering the actions set out in the Recovery Plan. Many actions originally set out have now been delivered and this report sets out how we build on that success and continue to make progress on those that remain within the context of our reform programme.

All this has only been possible due to the hard work and commitment of the people who work in our NHS and social care services. Their dedication, both during the pandemic itself and in the years since, has been essential in delivering the highest standards of care for the people of Scotland, and we will continue to support and work with our social care workforce as we look ahead to fulfil our core vision of supporting the people of Scotland to live longer, healthier and more fulfilling lives.