Richard Boyd Barrett (Dún Laoghaire, People Before Profit Alliance) | Oireachtas source

Would Mr. Breslin accept that we are caught on the horns of a major dilemma here, where one is damned if one does and damned if one does not, arising from the fact that on entering into this crisis we had woefully inadequate levels of capacity in intensive care units, ICU, beds, staff and consultants? That is the fundamental problem. It was unacceptable, on entering into the crisis, that we were already operating at near to 100% capacity, and were sometimes overwhelmed during flu season. On top of this, for the foreseeable future, there is an additional care need around a pandemic that could surge at any point in time. Unless we dramatically ramp up capacity we could be in deep trouble in the near future.