Kathleen Lynch (Cork North Central, Labour) | Oireachtas source

On suicide prevention, aftercare and the process when people are in crisis, Wexford is now providing 12,000 counselling hours and has received additional funding. In addition, the suicide crisis assessment nurse service, SCAN, in Wexford is a skilled mental health nursing service for primary care. As the Deputy knows, primary care is provided on a 24-hour basis. It provides an accessible and quick response to GP requests for a timely assessment of those in suicide or self harm distress.

One of the areas I have concerns about is why people with a mental health difficulty have to come through A&E. Clearly, if they have a physical injury, it has to be assessed and put right. One of the things we will look at is the number of beds - whether it is the right number, whether we should have more or fewer beds and how people get admissions to an acute unit.

All these issues will be dealt with by the new group.

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