Coronavirus now 'on the rampage' in Scots care homes, MSPs warned

Hundreds of residents have died of Coronavirus-related illnesses in care home settings across the country and Professor Sir Hugh Pennington has warned the nature of these establishments makes them "super spreading environments, as he gave evidence before Holyrood's health committee.

More than 500 elderly Scots have died in care homes up to April 19, official figures show, with 384 establishments reporting at least one case.

Prof Pennington is one of the most eminent epidemiologists in the UK and has chaired official inquiries into E-Coli outbreaks in Scotland and Wales.

"I would classify care homes at the moment where there has been a virus as almost super-spreading environments where the virus is really going on the rampage,” he told MSPs today.

"The way care homes are set up, they're set up for social interaction between the residents and, of course, the staff have to be close to the residents.

"Many of the residents will have dementia and so on which which makes it difficult because they may have forgotten, because of their illness, they may have forgotten about hygiene."

Among the worst cases in Scotland have been Berelands in Prestwick where 20 have died from COVID-19 related symptoms, as well as Burlington Court in Glasgow where 16 have died.

Prof Pennington added: "We've known this for many, many years that care homes are places where once you get an infection into care home, it has a very good chance of spreading far more than in the community at large."

The crucial reproduction rate, know as the "R" figure, which determines how widely the virus is spreading is now below one across Scotland, which means each infected person is passing it onto fewer than one other person on average, resulting in numbers flattening out and declining.

But Prof Pennington warned that the situation in care homes will be far more precarious.

"In a care home, under the best circumstances, even the best run care homes, the R level will be much higher, probably higher than 10 and maybe more than that," he added.

"The only way we can stop care home problems is to stop the virus getting in there in the first place because once it gets in there, the virus really does - it's out of control."