Thousands of stabbings take place every year

Last year there were more than 9,000 violent incidents in the Strathclyde area.

Andrew Murday, director of the Scottish Heart Transplant Unit, said the issue has to be reviewed.

Mr Murday said knife crime was a public health priority which the health board should look at.

He told BBC Radio's Sunday Live programme: "If people realised that your chances of being murdered in Glasgow were twice as high as they are in London then people would hopefully begin to talk about it.

"We hope that the Greater Glasgow NHS, the health board, might consider taking up the issue of violence as a specific targeted area for public health efforts."

Sword attacks

He added: "You're talking about thousands of people affected each year, just in Glasgow alone."

Mr Murday is calling for a multi-agency approach involving police, religious groups, community groups and a full debate on knife carrying and its effects.

Last year Strathclyde Police found nearly 3,000 blades being carried illegally in a public place.

Rudy Crawford, an A&E consultant at Glasgow Royal Infirmary, said: "People carry all sorts of weapons, some of them quite horrific, ranging from small pocket knives that they think can't inflict a fatal injury, which is entirely wrong, up to machetes, bayonets, swords.