Mr. Jim Breslin:

Those figures are up to last week. One of the factors is that the whole health service was restricted in what it was doing because of the presence of the virus to the extent that it was within our community. That did affect private hospitals. We concluded the heads of terms of agreement with the private hospitals but there were protracted discussions with private hospital consultants. We have more than 280 private hospital consultants on board. More are finalising their position with us, which is the majority of the cohort. The private hospitals are happy with the sign up that they have at this stage and that it can work within their hospitals and that we have the manpower to do so.

On the continuity of care issues that the Deputy has referred to, that is dependent on the consultant under whose care the person is being treated. If that consultant signs up to the arrangements, all of his or her patients move across with him or her at the very point in treatment that they are at. They do not go back to the start of the queue or back to a GP. They stay with that consultant based on the point that they are at on the care spectrum. The one distinction is that they do not pay a fee to that hospital consultant nor does the health insurer. The reason is that we are going to pay a salary to the hospital consultant so he or she cannot be paid twice.