Cathal Crowe (Clare, Fianna Fail) | Oireachtas source

By any metric or logic, I cannot understand why the most pressurised group of hospitals in the country was omitted. This is now progressing. A business case has already been filed for Cork and plans are pending for Galway and Dublin while there is no suggestion of an elective hospital in the most pressurised corner of the country, the mid-west, Clare, Limerick and Tipperary. I will make a proposal to the witnesses. This is something I have been dealing with in the Dáil Chamber as well. We had some warm and positive responses from the Taoiseach just last week. There is a brand new road being built along the border between the counties of Limerick and Clare, the Limerick northern distributor road. It is opening up tracts of land that heretofore were just grazed by cattle. The first phase of that road will be completed in August of this year. The University of Pittsburgh Medical Center, a non-profit private hospital group, is planning to open a 150-bed private hospital along that route. It is perfectly located near the Limerick tunnel, it is accessible to people in Tipperary and, crucially, it is on that border between Clare and Limerick. It is as centred within the region as you can possibly get. If they really want to unburden University Hospital Limerick of its problems through Sláintecare, it is essential that the witnesses look at having a public wing within that new hospital to separate things out at UHL. I ask that this become part of the agenda. There cannot be a shut-door policy on this matter. I want those names. I want our committee to undertake-----