(c) playbuzz.com/nicklivingston

It’s been more than 80 years since ‘No Mean City’ was set in Glasgow and comedians, including our own, continue to base their humour on an image of a violent, drunken people but the last ten years have seen them become increasingly out of touch with the reality on the streets. See these recent reports revealing Scotland’s drift away from several negative indicators:

Scotland’s homicide rate falls by 47%, is lower than the rate for England and Wales and has fallen faster than many other countries in the ten years of SNP government

Of 35 children and teenagers killed with knives in Britain in 2017, not one was in Scotland, yet in 2005, the UN called Scotland the most violent country in the developed world.

Reported domestic violence in Scotland falls. Is this part of wider change?

Scotland’s university cities by far the safest places to send your children

Today, I read in the Independent:

‘Alcohol-related admissions have risen by more than two-thirds in a decade, with the figure now standing at more than 1.1 million in 2017, according to data released by Public Health England (PHE).’

http://www.independent.co.uk/news/uk/home-news/nhs-latest-alcohol-addiction-hospital-admissions-record-high-support-services-rehab-cut-jeremy-hunt-a8200876.html

So, quickly, I checked the Scottish figures and found:

‘In 2016/17 there were 36, 235 alcohol-related hospital admissions (stays) in general acute hospitals in Scotland. ‘

http://www.isdscotland.org/Health-Topics/Drugs-and-Alcohol-Misuse/Publications/2017-11-21/2017-11-21-ARHS-Report.pdf?

1.1 million and 36 235? You don’t have to be good at estimation to see what looks like a huge difference per capita so I checked the Independent hadn’t made a mistake. Here are the actual data from Public Health England:

In England, in 2017, there were 1 140 882 admissions to hospital for alcohol-related causes. This was a 38% increase from 2009/10.

https://fingertips.phe.org.uk/profile/local-alcohol-profiles/supporting-information/quarterly-data

So, with ten times the population, you might have expected England to have around three to four hundred thousand admissions at most, but they had around three times as many at 1 140 882 admissions. Interestingly, the Independent had a link to another report titled: ‘More than half of adults drink to cope with stress’. Merrie England under the Tories?