THE CONCERNING EXTENT OF SEXUAL ASSAULTS AND RAPES IN SCOTTISH HOSPITALS 2019-2024
By Carolyn Brown Mary Howden
Our latest report focuses on sexual assaults in our Scottish hospitals, How safe are our Scottish hospitals? The concerning extent of sexual assaults and rapes in Scottish hospitals 2019-2024. The report highlights that NHS boards and private hospitals are failing to safeguard women and girls.
This report surveyed 198 hospitals, which included 11 private hospitals, in Scotland with FOI requests sent to Police Scotland. We found that data regarding sexual assaults is not routinely kept by all hospitals.
Police Scotland were unable to provide data on the number of sexual assaults and rapes committed in 133 of 198 hospitals and refused to provide data for 8 hospitals on privacy grounds. As a result, the figures we gathered only apply to 57 hospitals.
Between 2019 and 2024, 288 sexual assaults including rapes were reported. 163 of these assaults occurred on hospital wards. These figures will be much lower than the actual number of assaults perpetrated due to NHS Boards’ lack of systematic and coherent data gathering. Our report gathered data from all types of hospitals: general, psychiatric, maternity, children’s, private and palliative care. Sexual assaults were recorded in all hospital types.
Our politicians and NHS leaders have known about these safeguarding issues for at least the last ten years, and yet they have done nothing to address these shocking statistics. They have done nothing to facilitate the implementation of measures which could have reduced the risk of women and girls being assaulted in NHS provisions.
