Stephen Donnelly (Wicklow, Fianna Fail) | Oireachtas source

It is going really well. I opened three primary care centres last Friday. We now have 167 primary care centres around the country. There are a lot more in construction, with more to be opened. There are 13 centres in construction, with another five in advanced planning and 29 in early planning. There are many primary care centres. As the Deputy stated and as colleagues will be aware, they are not like the community health centres of old; they are like small hospitals. Many of them have diagnostics and big GP practices. They have mental health teams, disability teams and primary care teams, and there is an energy and passion within the centres and these teams. They have the older person specialist teams and chronic disease management teams. The energy is incredible. It is a very exciting innovation and development.