It is the largest health board in Scotland and had the highest pest control spend across the country with a total of £2.1 million over five years.
That included 61 called call outs for ants and a further 33 for rodents across city hospitals in the first four months of 2024 alone, according to data obtained by Scottish Labour through freedom of information requests.
Across Scotland as a whole, health boards spend just under £4.3 million controlling pests, which varied from maggots, dead birds and cockroaches.
In NHS Highland, the call outs included a mouse nest in a nurse’s bedroom, as well as a rat infestation at a doctors’ house, bed bugs in patient accommodation and mice droppings “over everything” in a Fort William dental unit.
There had also been reported issues with maggots, cockroaches and squirrels in NHS Lothian, while mice, rats and a dead bird were amongst the discoveries in NHS Forth Valley.
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Dame Jackie Baillie, health spokeswoman for Scottish Labour, warned Scottish Government ministers that the figures were part of an ongoing battle for health boards to keep their hospitals and clinics safe for public use.
Spending on pest control per health board across 2019 to 2024 included:
- £170,366 in NHS Ayrshire and Arran and covered reports of ants in the maternity department, maggots in the dining room and a mouse running around the x-ray waiting room.
- NHS Borders spent £90,386, with 18 call outs for black ants in 2024 and 12 for wasps in 2023-24.
- In Dumfries and Galloway, £105,964 was spent across the five years, and included a dead rabbit on the patio of a mental health building.
- NHS Fife spent £286,188, reporting biting insects, rodents, wasps and birds.
- £729,221 was spent in NHS Lanarkshire. The report said: “Patients was on ward with an open flesh wound. Now patient away flies disappeared. No treatment required.”
- NHS Orkney spent £13,286 on mice, birds and rats, while NHS Western Isles spent £9,335 on wasps and blue bottles in 2023-24.
- £18,000 was spent on hospital buildings in Shetland but no further information was supplied.
- Across NHS Tayside, £73,432 was spent, including on wasps reported in the blood sciences lab, ants in the sexual health clinic and mice in a ward.
Dame Jackie said: “These figures tell a story of a constant battle to keep our crumbling hospitals and clinics safe from pests.
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“The UK Labour government delivered a record budget settlement for NHS capital projects – the SNP must make sure every penny goes to improving our NHS estate.”
The Scottish Labour deputy leader also said frontline NHS services should be prioritised to ensure “patients and staff alike know that their environment is sanitary, clean and safe.”
The Scottish Government, meanwhile, said a record £21 billion has been pledged in the 2025-26 budget for the country’s health and social care sector, with “transformational” investment at the heart of plans.
A spokesman said: “Our 2025-26 draft Budget sets out a record £21 billion for health and social care, including more than £1 billion capital investment and £140 million additional funding across NHS infrastructure to allow our health capital programme to restart.
“We want to deliver this transformational investment and drive further improvements for patients, but to do that, Parliament must approve our Budget Bill to unlock investment to drive the progress – and the healthier population – that we all want to see.”
Comparatively, it was revealed that £3.7 million was spent on pest control ain NHS England between 2021-22 and 2023-2024.
Earlier this year, the Liberal Democrats revealed staff were bitten by bugs while rats roamed maternity and emergency wards, with more than 18,000 pest incidents across English hospitals since 2021.
Overall in NHS England, there had been a rise in reported pests in hospitals, from 5,292 in 2021-22, increasing to 6,666 in 2023-24, freedom of information statistics revealed. The Department of Health and Social Care said in April that NHS hospital trusts were legally responsible for maintaining their estates.