Scotland’s health secretary has called for care workers from abroad who are at the forefront of the covid-19 response to get the same treatment as foreign NHS workers and be allowed to stay in the UK.

The UK government promised last month that international health service staff would have their visas extended free of charge for a year, but the announcement did not cover care staff.

It was thought there are nearly 10,000 EU nationals employed in social care in Scotland, though this figure does not include people from the rest of the world.

In a reply to a question from healthandcare.scot at the government’s daily media briefing on Sunday, health secretary Jeane Freeman said there is “no good reason” to treat social care staff differently and said she would be urging the UK Government to extend its promise to carers.

“What our social care workers do, wherever they come from, is vitally important and they are valuable and valued, not only by those to whom they give care with such attention and compassion, but by me and by the Scottish government,” Ms Freeman said.

“So, there is no good reason that I can see why you would take a different stand for our NHS workers as compared with our social care workers.”

“Both groups of staff are vitally important in the work they are doing on this pandemic and actually they are vitally important every single day regardless of whether we have a pandemic or not.”

It follows a letter to Home Secretary Priti Patel from organisations representing Scotland’s care sector and voluntary groups urging her to treat care workers and volunteers the same.

Camphill Scotland, which supports around 650 people with learning disabilities, warns some of its volunteers will have to leave the UK “as soon as travel restrictions are eased” unless the Home Office acts.

The Home Office told healthandcare.scot is it working “to see if we can assist other frontline workers during this crisis.”

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