Pat Buckley (Cork East, Sinn Fein) | Oireachtas source

Last Monday, it was reported in the press that there were no child and adolescent mental health services, CAMHS, available in emergency departments in Cork. The HSE said that the recruitment difficulties had affected the CAMHS service in Cork, particularly since the start of the year. Since January, it has been particularly difficult to maintain the non-consultant hospital doctors' on-call rota for the two Cork city emergency departments due to a combination of vacancies, sick leave and other factors. However, further resignations - I stress, resignations - and sick leave have compounded the service difficulties. The HSE said that, since 25 March, it has not been possible to guarantee as responsive a service to the emergency departments as it would like. To put the question simply, why is this happening?

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