Mr. Paul Reid:

I have two responses. First, there is nothing hidden regarding new roles. Ms O’Connor is due to take up a new role as managing director of one of the groups within the VHI. We wish her well. Her loss will be huge but thankfully she will not be lost to the health system.

As the Deputy mentioned, I sent out an internal communication that, based on our commitment to Sláintecare, Mr. Liam Woods will take up a new role as implementation lead to ensure that from a line perspective, they are integral in terms of inputs, design and ownership of execution.

Second, in regard to medical laboratory scientists, I recognise again, as I have done very publicly, that the role they have played throughout Covid-19 has been phenomenal. Their response, commitment and the sacrifices they and many other healthcare workers made has been exemplary. For example, if we take the infrastructure commitment that they and others brought us from, we had the National Virus Reference Laboratory, NVRL, at the start of this pandemic with a capacity of about 600 per week. We have moved to a capacity of more than 300,000 in terms of Covid-19 testing. That did not happen just by putting infrastructure in place. There was also a process, change management and people's commitment.