Kate O'Connell (Dublin Bay South, Fine Gael) | Oireachtas source

It can operate by itself. On the fallout from private hospitals, maybe this is a question for Dr. Keegan but there is anecdotal evidence that it has emerged that some treatments are being done in private hospitals, especially in the field of elective cosmetic surgery, and then the sick person is ending up in the public system. If the damage is done in a private hospital and then the patient arrives into the public hospital, is there any recourse for the public system in cleaning up the mess it has had nothing to do with publicly? The patient is obviously a public patient at this point but how does the public system manage the fallout from possibly unnecessary operations when it has plenty of people who require necessary and urgent operations? I have seen an emergence of people being admitted from elective cosmetic surgeries recently. How do we deal with that situation where the likes of St. James's Hospital ends up with a person who has undergone a botched procedure? Do we bill them?