What assessment it (a) has made and (b) will make to understand any difference in the return rates for bowel screening kits between the lea…

A report recently published by Public Health Scotland provides details of the most recent statistics for the bowel screening programme, which includes the uptake differences between areas of different socioeconomic status. The overall uptake continues to exceed the HIS standard of 60% of the eligible population, but there continue to be inequalities in the return rates for bowel screening kits, including between the least and most deprived communities in Scotland.
Since 2017, the Scottish Government has provided £1 million funding annually to address screening inequalities, part of which has been distributed to NHS Boards to fund initiatives catering to their specific populations.
The funding is also used for national initiatives, such as the development of the Screening Intelligence Platform (ScIP), which aims to simplify the process of gathering and analysing all screening data. This will allow greater insight into screening inequalities across a range of characteristics, including socioeconomic status, and supporting efforts to increase screening uptake across all groups.
In addition, the Equity in Screening Strategy was published last year. This set out a vision for equitable access across the full screening pathway, including in the bowel screening programme. It is accompanied by the implementation of an Equity in Screening Network that allows those who work across screening to share evidence, best practice and learning around screening inequalities. This will enable NHS Boards to consider proven interventions to address inequalities in uptake, and therefore increase participation in the bowel screening programme.