Michael McNamara (Clare, Independent) | Oireachtas source

I am hoping the Minister will help me to understand the current strategy. At the beginning of this we were told that the strategy was to flatten the curve. We were told that the virus would spread, as viruses do but that we needed to flatten the curve to ensure that our health system was not overrun and we did not have scenes like those in Italy and Spain. At the time that the restrictions were introduced, numbers were rising from 170 in hospital to 440, from 50 in ICU to 80. Four months ago on 29 April there were 1,185 cases in hospital in Ireland, of which 120 were in critical care units. Three times today the Minister told us that we were looking at a complete lockdown and that we were at a tipping point. We have been hearing a lot about tipping points. We have heard about tipping points since June. We were also told today by the HSE that 22 patients were admitted to hospital with Covid-19, six of whom are in ICU. I accept that for those 22 patients and their families and particularly for the six patients in ICU and their families, this is an incredibly worrying and stressful time but what I do not understand is how the Minister can possibly talk about a national lockdown given those figures and given that our health system coped with 1,185 cases four months ago.

What is the strategy here? What are we hoping to achieve, if not that our health system is not overrun? I note that earlier this week Dr. Glynn accepted that we cannot eliminate the virus. That seems to be the general consensus. I accept that there are some who are calling for it to be eliminated but Dr. Glynn said that he does not think we can eliminate it here. There is a growing acceptance that we cannot eliminate it and even if we do, what do we do then? We open up and we go through the same cycle. The Minister talked about lockdowns and said a couple of times that they work but Argentina has been in a lockdown for six months and its figures are spiralling.

Earlier this week we heard Dr. Hans Kluge, the European director of the World Health Organization, on RTÉ news saying that lockdowns do not work. Where are we going? What is the strategy?