A Holyrood committee says health professionals should prescribe exercise and physical activity more as a way to keep people healthy.

In a report published today MSPs on the health and sport committee state the practice should be seen as an investment in people’s health that will pay long-term dividends, not a cost.

This would mean patients being advised to take up exercise as a preventative measure to stop people getting ill, rather than reacting after they develop health problems.

Potential advantages include tackling loneliness and social isolation, preventing long-term conditions like heart disease or diabetes, and reducing dependence on pharmaceutical prescriptions.

Integration authorities in charge of health and social care are being asked to spend 5% of their budgets on social prescribing and focus this on the least well-off Scots.

The committee is also asking for more clarity from the Scottish Government about its commitment to recruit 250 new community link workers – staff based in GP practices offering non-clinical support to patients to help them address issues broader than a specific illness or condition.

Health committee convener Lewis Macdonald MSP says the value of social prescribing is “indisputable”:

“We want to see social prescriptions treated as equal to medical prescriptions.

“However, social prescribing should not be seen as a cost-free alternative to medical prescriptions. It is in fact an investment in the health and wellbeing of our country’s citizens and should be used not just as a reactive health measure but as a preventative measure from our earliest years.”

The north-east MSP also called for more funding for sports clubs and exercise projects:

“Access to services and suitable physical activities is key and the committee wants to see a funding commitment from the government which helps fund the infrastructure to provide these services.

“The Cabinet Secretary for Health and Sport seems convinced of the need for such initiatives, so we want to know why this is not being delivered at scale across all NHS boards and Integration Authorities.

“We also want to see the growing inequality gap between active and non-active populations, with its consequential health and wellbeing impacts, addressed urgently.

“The majority of any government investment in social prescribing should be spent in the most deprived areas to help tackle this inequality.”