Matt Shanahan (Waterford, Independent) | Oireachtas source

I welcome our guests and thank them for their excellent work and the tenor of the report they have produced. It is very important that they have taken a forward-looking view and I accept that there may have to be some retrospective learning done at another time. We must now go about the business of protecting all of our aged in the future and making sure they have adequate resources in private and public nursing homes. I commend the quality of the report and its future perspective. It is to be hoped it will provide a template to deliver dignity, respect and resourcing to nursing home residents.

Early on in the Covid pandemic, I was one of those who engaged with nursing homes. I asked that swabs be taken in-house nationally when clinicians were capable of doing so and that a pathway be provided into hospital labs for PCR testing rather than having samples sent to the National Virus Reference Laboratory which was taking up to seven days to turn around tests. Thankfully, a lot of that was delivered.

I wish to discuss some of the issues for private nursing homes. I know they are vilified from time to time, but in my experience of Waterford county and city I can say that, without exception, tremendous care is given by the public and private sectors. Some of the issues highlighted at the time have probably not been fully dealt with. In terms of the Covid pathway, nursing homes are expected to provide isolation facilities which are taking up potential bed occupancy. This has a knock-on effect in terms of revenue. Another issue at the outset of the pandemic was the management of oxygen in nursing homes, which required sign-off by a palliative consultant, something which did not always happen as quickly as it should. Do the witnesses believe these issues will be dealt with following the report?

I refer to point of care testing. We have heard a lot about PCR testing in this country, but diagnostic testing is available in the United States, in particular. Has such testing been considered in order to allow for a faster turnaround time in nursing homes to allow isolation to take place immediately and contacts to be quarantined?