Ms Marie O'Shea:

It is difficult to know what is accurate and what is not. Are the returns to the Minister for Health or the claims for payment the most accurate? I added a caveat stating the figure was based on returns to the Minister for Health. This is what it is supposed to be based on but it has to be acknowledged that there is a discrepancy. If one counts claims as comprising the accurate figure, one will see that there were 19,943 in the three-year period to 2021. However, it is difficult to know.