Dr. Anthony O'Connor:

We started with 700,000 people on the waiting lists for hospital care. By the time we get back to work, we will be dealing with at least six months' pent-up demand and less capacity to deal with it than ever before. We have heard a great deal about patients being locked out of care in recent weeks, but what has not been stressed enough is that public patients have been completely locked out of care and are likely to remain so for the foreseeable future. We need to see a roadmap by which that care can open as soon as possible for everybody, not just for private patients but for public patients too.

We have been told for the past three months that we are in it together and to hold firm. We cannot continue to lock public patients out of the service any longer. We need a good and robust plan for how we are going to get public outpatient and inpatient services up and running.