Stephen Donnelly (Wicklow, Fianna Fail) | Oireachtas source

I thank the Deputy for his questions. He asked if online and telemedicine is being used and it is. It has been a real silver lining. If necessity is the mother of all invention, telemedicine has come to the fore. Many consultants who would not have used it previously are not only using it now but actively embracing it. It is something that will continue and as distributed technologies, remote sensors and so forth become more prevalent, more will be possible.

The Deputy asked how we will deal with the backlog and there are many different ways. I will ask the Minister of State, Deputy Rabbitte, to speak on this as she has led what is a spectacular success in respect of assessment of need. I would love her to update the committee on that. Essentially, there are at least two strands, with one strand building the permanent capacity in line with the Sláintecare vision of community-based care and so forth, and that is what the national service plan and winter plan are all about. The second concerns the access to care fund, which comprises targeted interventions. Last year, we were able to allocate €7.8 million and the Minister of State has used this to specifically address the very serious backlog for children with assessment of need. I will ask her to give the committee an update on that because thanks to her leadership, it has been an incredible success.