Matt Carthy (Cavan-Monaghan, Sinn Fein) | Oireachtas source

While Deputy Murphy is preparing her notes, I have two points to make in respect of the briefing note circulated by the HSE.

The first is on the contact with the individuals whose data had been exposed during the cyberattack in 2021. The HSE indicates that it has begun sending out letters to 113,000 individuals. It says that over the 16-week notifiable period, subjects will receive a letter from the HSE advising them that their data were part of the data breach. It indicates that they are invited to register through an online portal to speak to an agent or to log on to a request to view the relevant data.

My concern in this regard is that these are people whose files obviously were in the hands of the HSE and as there will be varying degrees to which the information was sensitive or of concern, I believe there is a need to be proactive in particular instances. One would be where the data which were exposed were of an extremely sensitive nature and the second would where the individuals involved may not have easy access to being able to log on to an online portal. It would be important for the HSE to be proactive in both those instances and it would be worth corresponding with the executive to ask how it plans to deal with those two specific types of issues. If you receive a letter which indicates that your data have been exposed without having any idea as to what the level of exposure was or how sensitive that information might have been; there is a chance that you may not go onto the portal. One may also be dealing with people who have moderate disabilities and who might not be in position to access the written correspondence and follow up accordingly.

The second part of the correspondence where I seek further clarification is point 9 in the correspondence. This relates to the provision of ICU beds. It indicates there is a plan in place to increase the number of ICU beds from 255, as was the case in December 2020, to the 446, which were committed to at that point. The letter indicates that the HSE has now reached 323 beds, which is still a fair distance away from the target. It also states that the number of beds open on a given day varies depending on staffing and other operational issues. It would be useful to get further clarification and perhaps a tabular breakdown as to the actual number of ICU beds that have been available on a daily and weekly basis, have been used by patients, and were available for their use in order that we can get a clearer picture in respect of the implementation of that particular plan.