Colm Burke (Cork North Central, Fine Gael) | Oireachtas source

I may not use them all.

I thank the witnesses for the work they have done over the past six months. It has been a challenging time for everyone. It is important that we work together to resolve outstanding issues and ensure our nursing homes and the care of the elderly are managed in the best possible way.

My opening question is on an issue I also raised with HIQA, which was mentioned in the presentation, and that is the planning for nursing homes between 1 January and the middle of April. While an approach had been adopted of getting people out of the hospitals to make room available in them to deal with people who need urgent care, there was a need for communication with nursing homes about how they needed to upskill and upgrade the service that they provided, particularly in the area of infection control. Was this issue examined by the Department to put more pressure on nursing homes, both public and private? I will give a simple example of what I am talking about. In one HSE facility as opposed to a nursing home, there were not even changing facilities for staff who came into work or finished work every morning or evening. Were those issues considered by the Department in the planning for dealing with this new challenge in our health service?