SCOTLAND’S NHS does not have the staff, money and resources it needs – that fact has been obvious for years now. But the day-to-day consequences of the shortages – for staff, for patients, for everyone – are as shocking as ever.

The under-resourcing is obvious wherever you look. The Royal College of Nursing says many nurses are leaving their jobs because they are demoralised by conditions which make it harder to provide safe care. There is also a serious shortage of junior doctors, GPs and consultants; and many of the service’s vital specialist areas, including oncology, are struggling to find the staff they need.

Now a consultant has spelled out exactly where these shortages are leading. Writing in The Herald today, consultant cardiologist Robin Northcote says that, under the current conditions, it is only a question of time before some frontline services disappear. This is not scaremongering, says Mr Northcote, this is what is really happening in the NHS and he blames pay and conditions. “We are unable to attract high quality candidates from throughout the UK as a result of Scottish Government policy in relation to remuneration and working conditions,” he says.

The answer – more and better funding – is self-evident, although apparently not self-evident enough for the Scottish Government. According to research by Professor Jim Gallagher of Nuffield College, Oxford, if spending on health had risen at the same level as the Scottish block grant in the last ten years, there would be £1billion more in the NHS today than there is. The Government does deserve credit for its GP recruitment drive last year, but the fact that it failed to find the desired numbers is a reflection of the bigger problem: pay and conditions are not good enough and the only way to put that right is to increase funding.

Naturally, we should also ask whether we are spending money in the right places, which is one of the reasons The Herald is this week launching a major new series on health. The aim of A Bitter Pill is to investigate the effects of prescription pills and drugs on Scottish society, and today we start by looking at the drugs prescribed for Attention Deficit Hyperactivity Disorder (ADHD). In 2009/10, just 1,265 under tens were given stimulants such as Ritalin; in 2015/16, that figure was 2,166 – a rise of 71 per cent.

Medication works for many children, but when the number of under-10s being prescribed drugs for ADHD has nearly doubled in seven years, it is also rational to ask whether they are being over-prescribed. It is also fair to ask whether drugs are being prescribed because other effective solutions are too expensive.

All of these questions, about what the NHS does and how it does it, come back to the same problem: resources. Obviously, we have to examine all the reasons for the recruitment crisis, including the way doctors are trained. But the Government must also urgently tackle the most important reason, lack of funding, before Mr Northcote’s prediction of disappearing services comes true.