HEALTH Secretary Humza Yousaf has warned that the number of people in hospital with Covid-19 “may well continue to increase” over the coming weeks.

There are currently 2,322 Covid patients in hospital with the virus, the highest daily number during the pandemic.

The number of patients in Scottish hospitals with Covid-19 has more than doubled since February.

Scottish Government figures showed there had been another 44 coronavirus-linked deaths and 13,564 new cases of the virus in the past 24 hours.

Addressing the number of hospitalisation, Mr Yousaf told MSPs: “It has now passed the previous peak of last winter when we had 2,053 patients in hospital with Covid in January 2021.

“Using the latest published Covid-19 modelling, we anticipate this may well continue to increase over the next couple or few weeks.

“The increase in cases and hospitalisations is largely due to the dominance of the more transmissible Omicron BA.2 variant that accounts for around 90 per cent of all reported cases.”

Mr Yousaf stressed that the increase in hospitalisations “has not thankfully translated into increased cases of severe illness requiring intensive care”.

He added: “However, this level of continued pressure is challenging in the context of a health service that has been dealing with sustained and relentless demand and pressure for nearly two years.”

The Health Secretary pointed to a huge increase in NHS staff absence that he said “puts an incredible strain on the delivery of health services”.

He pointed to elective services restarting across the NHS.

But he added: “We are now receiving reports that some restarted electives are having to be postponed again to deal with that increasing pressure that our health boards are facing at this extended time.”

Scottish Conservative health spokesman, Dr Sandesh Gulhane, said Mr Yousaf’s update to MSPs was merely a “list of excuses”.

He said: “This is not all due to Covid. Your lack of credible workforce planning and a flimsy Covid recovery plan has led us to this.”

Scottish Labour health spokeswoman, Jackie Baillie, was also critical, saying while the NHS had worked “tirelessly” throughout the pandemic they were “being let down by this Government”.

Ms Baillie said: “Perhaps the NHS would have been more resilient if the cabinet secretary’s predecessors hadn’t cut beds, had fixed the workforce crisis and had sorted social care.

“These problems are not new, they predate the pandemic.”

She accused Mr Yousaf of “playing fast and loose with the lives of Scots”.

She added: “We need more than sticking plaster solutions and more excuses.”

The Health Secretary responded by pointing to the impact the pandemic had had on the NHS.

“We have the highest number of people in hospital with Covid,” he said.

“We have the highest level of community transmission because of Covid. We have high levels of workforce absence because people are testing positive for Covid.

“We can’t just magic away the pandemic, as much as I would like to.”

Mr Yousaf insisted: “If we can keep Covid under control, that would be the best tool to aid our recovery.”