Annie Hoey (Labour) | Oireachtas source

I hope everyone can hear me. I reiterate what everyone has said. I thank all the witnesses so much for being here and for the work that they and their teams are doing. It is deeply appreciated by all of us here and, I am sure, many members of the public.

I will focus on two areas. The phrase "colossal health crisis" has been used in this session. We are obviously in a colossal health crisis but we arguably have an even more colossal health crisis coming down the line in dealing with the backlog that is being created and the knock-on consequences of Covid. We briefly talked about waiting lists. Has Mr. Woods any figures available - I would be happy to take them in writing - on how much the waiting lists have increased by? Before the Covid crisis we were constantly talking about waiting lists and the numbers going up. Has he figures for the waiting lists, particularly for cancer care and coronary care? For example, does he know how many cancer diagnoses there were in 2019 compared to 2020, which would perhaps tell us have we missed cancer care diagnoses? I had a meeting with the Irish Cancer Society over the summer and the society estimated by then that 600 cancer diagnosis had been missed. In the months following that, they estimated there would have been many more. Has Mr. Woods any thoughts on those waiting lists and those whose care we may have missed out on despite the best efforts to not do so?