Aberdeenshire’s health and social care board is expected to face an extra £11.8 million burden on its budget this year due to the coronavirus pandemic.
During yesterday’s meeting of the region’s Integration Joint Board (IJB), members were updated on the current financial situation after the first three months of the financial year – April, May and June.
The board, made up of representatives from the council, NHS Grampian and others, heard that over this period it incurred additional costs of £2.985m as a result of Covid-19, including £1m on personal protective equipment (PPE).
Chief finance officer Alan Sharp told the meeting: “We’ve incurred significant additional costs in areas such as PPE, sustainability payments to social care providers, extra staffing and we’ve had a loss of income in some areas as well.
“Our total projection for additional costs for the year for Covid-19 is £11.8 million, and we’ve incurred just under £3m of that in the first quarter.”
However, Mr Sharp explained the IJB also recorded an underspend of just more than half a million pounds.
He added: “The main factors that have led to this underspend is a lower demand for social care services in the first quarter, particularly around residential care where we’ve seen a reduction of numbers in care homes.
“We’ve also seen savings in our community hospital costs as a result of reduced capacity, and that’s had an impact on areas like bank nursing spend, and we’ve also seen savings in travel costs and training costs.”