Mr. Liam Woods:

The bed capacity in Limerick vis-à-visthe population was what I referring to at one level. That was assessed and is known to be beneath what was required, which is the additional 100 beds we are referring to. Indeed, earlier developments in Limerick that have supported capacity such as the ICU, the ED, dialysis and the Leben Building have all been directed at growing and improving capacity. Clearly, there has been a demand and supply mismatch and those 100 beds will support addressing that.

However, I also said that hospital beds are not the solution in isolation in the health environment. In fact, excess focus on hospital beds as against community investment will lead to an ineffective situation. From our point of view, we must also focus on investing in community services around Limerick.The community intervention team that is working opposite the hospital there and out into the community is very successful. Supporting that and expanding community initiatives would be very useful. There are initiatives under way in Limerick and across the wider region out into Clare and in Nenagh relating to cataracts that are helping to support the health of the population without bringing patients into Limerick at all, and investing in more of that type of work in our model 2 hospitals in Ennis and Nenagh would be very useful. There are some outreach clinics running in primary care centres from Limerick and we need more of that to support GPs and to bring specialist consultant advice to GPs at local level without having to refer patients to the hospital base.