Analysis: Scotland - A watershed for children's health

Without a clear steer from national government, children's health needstend to be swallowed up by the sheer volume of adult care.

So the Scottish Executive's proposals on how it intends to focus thehearts and minds of Scotland's 12 NHS boards and their partners on thisissue marks a watershed for children's health services in the country(Children Now, 19-25 April).

Little in the Action Framework for Children and Young People's Health inScotland is new policy. But the document sets targets and timetablesthat children's professionals can organise themselves around.

As Malcolm Wright, chair of the Children and Young People's HealthSupport Group that has overseen the framework's development, says: "Forthe first time a whole raft of evidence and existing policies have beenbrought together. The framework will make clear within NHS boardsthroughout Scotland what we need to do to improve children'shealth."