Scotland is to put a freeze on a bonus scheme for its NHS consultants. The decision means that no new awards will be granted when existing recipients retire. This will save up to £2 million, which will then be free up for reallocation towards frontline services.

The bonus scheme, formally known as distinction awards, has been recognising medical consultants since the beginning of the NHS itself. It came out to £28 million last year.

Chief Medical Officer of Scotland, Dr. Harry Burns, warns that the life expectancy rate of the Scottish population already lies behind other nations in Western Europe and might not improve quickly enough. The official demands more and better campaigns to promote well-being and health among citizens instead of deciding in such matters upon the population.

The Healthcare Environment Inspectorate (HEI) has found the conditions at Scotland's Royal Hospital for Sick Children to be immensely unsatisfactory. During an unannounced visit to the Yorkhill hospital, inspectors found such failings as blood on the equipment, overflowing bins and dirt and dust in the wards. The HEI has called for improvements in cleaning standards.

Scottish & Southern Energy is said to have posted a 6% fall in half-year profits to £385.5 million. This is said to have further justified as to why the Company happened to be the first energy group to increase its gas prices.

The UK's second-biggest energy supplier is said to have attributed its persistent losses to its decision to raise prices by nearly 10% from next month.

This was perhaps not the only reason for the lack of wind for a 16% fall in output from hydro-electric schemes and wind farms. However the dividends would still be raised 6.7% to 22.4p.

Ash Scotland, an anti-smoking campaign charity, claims that smoking costs the Scottish economy almost £1.1 billion per year. This estimate takes into account illnesses caused by smoking and productivity lost through smoking breaks.

The lost productivity alone, which includes absenteeism and lost output due to early death, made up more than £692 million. Treating smoking-related diseases additionally costs the NHS £271 million. £34 million is spent on just cleaning up tobacco-related litter, while the cost of fires caused by smoking was estimated to cost £12 million.

The first pub academy in Scotland would open its doors on Wednesday. The academy has been especially setup to train staff members in the hospitality industry and has been opened to provide courses from business management to bartending.

Scottish researchers have claimed that they have created a flexible material, called Metaflex, which can manipulate light, a remarkable breakthrough that could help develop “invisibility cloak”.

Real-life Harry Potter-style invisibility cloak or any other clothing will be capable of rendering objects invisible by bending and channeling light.

One of two challenges being faced by researchers in the creation of smart flexible materials to create invisible cloak is from visible light because its short wavelength demands the metamaterial atoms to be very small.

The Scottish Police Services Authority (SPSA) is required to immediately take measures to boost its organizational support for police forces along with addressing its budgets, warned Scotland’s spending regulator.

A report compiled by Audit Scotland discovered that the Scottish Police Services Authority had failed to match with the soaring technology needs of its customers. The main demands sought from the police forces by the customers, centers on information and communication technology support services.

A recent study has exposed the significant gap between life expectancies of the poor and the wealthy in Scotland. According to figures published by the Government, rich Scotsmen have a life expectancy of 75.2 years, 68 of which are spent in good health.

The other side of the picture sees Scottish men in the most impoverished areas living through 10.3 years of illness-almost twice the time for the rich.

An anti-smoking charity, ASH Scotland along with 32 other groups is demanding a ban on smoking in vehicles in Scotland in order to deal with ‘Scotland's biggest killer’.

The most recent statistics indicate that a quarter of all adult deaths in Scotland are due to illnesses related to smoke.

The charity stated that the change would emphasise the effect of second-hand smoke on other people, especially children.

A think tank in Scotland suggests encouraging students that are taking a gap year to be voluntarily active in their home regions instead of abroad.

A poll of Reform Scotland shows that students who usually join Voluntary Service Overseas (VSO) would equally be interested to stay in their home countries.

Two years ago, statistics laid out that 5% of Scottish employees are coming from the volunteer sector, which had an annual income of circa £4.1bn.

During an interview with The Herald, Health Secretary Nicola Sturgeon stated that the NHS in Scotland would require reductions in its budget and for the first time she admitted that the next year the health service will experience the spending cuts.

The comments made by Ms. Sturgeon seem a shift from her earlier opposition to reduction on public-sector funding that she was about to declare at Westminster and Holyrood.

A drop in the levels of Clostridium difficile has been reported by Health Protection Scotland (HPS). The superbug MRSA level too is said to have seen a downfall by as much as 45%. The drop for the former is nearly 42%.

Pledging to bring about further decrease in the level, Scottish Health Secretary Nicola Sturge is said to have welcomed the new data happily.

Last year during the same period, the number of cases reported for C diff was as much as 996; the same had been 639 cases for the last quarter. And this quarter is said to have witnessed a 10.5% decrease, taking the number to

Tristan Crumpton has been held guilty of misconduct, by the Health Professions Council tribunal. He is said to have also forged signatures in his attempt to cover up for the morphine which is said to have been missing.

He is reportedly putting the blame on the poor record-keeping department and had been sacked by the Scottish Ambulance Service last year. This was following the discovery of three broken vials of morphine. This discovery had been made at the Stonehaven station in the month of July.

Leaders of the Nursing fraternity in Scotland were all against a decision by a leading health authority. The decision by the authority was related to increasing the number of shifts being worked by the nurses to 14 shifts in a month from 13.

The Scottish Health Authority, NHS Grampian has proposed the current terms in relation to 240 nurses in the Aberdeen Royal infirmary. If successful, NHS Grampian would be able to save £385,000 in a single year.