Michael McNamara (Clare, Independent) | Oireachtas source

May I give Mr. Reid one example? I am aware of it because it is very close to me. The previous Minister for Health, Deputy Harris, accepted that the overcrowding levels at University Hospital Limerick would be unsustainable and that greater use would have to be made of the tier 2 hospitals - Nenagh General Hospital, St. John's Hospital in Limerick and Ennis General Hospital - to avoid everybody going into what was already an overcrowded hospital. Mr. Liam Woods of the HSE was before the committee twice and he explained that planning was ongoing for the provision of increased services in the tier 2 hospitals. I asked Ms O'Connor this question when she was last before us and she did not have an answer but said she would provide it in writing.

We are three months away from the peak of typical overcrowding in University Hospital Limerick. Yesterday, there were 65 people on trolleys in UHL. Today, there are only 53. There was no mention in the written response I received from the HSE as to what additional procedures would be carried out in tier 2 hospitals to stop people having to go into an already overcrowded hospital, UHL. There was not one mention of Ennis, Nenagh or St. John's hospitals.

If we are going to funnel everyone who is sick in the mid-west into UHL, which is dealing with Covid and emergency cases, it is inevitable that Covid will spread in there. We do not know exactly how many but there were many media reports about the large number of people who contracted Covid in our healthcare system and acute hospitals last winter, along with the large number who contracted it in nursing homes.

We have learned much which should be avoidable. What, however, is going to happen in the mid-west? Are we going to funnel everyone into an overcrowded hospital or will we use the tier 2 hospitals to ensure people do not have to attend UHL for medical services?