Donnchadh Ó Laoghaire (Cork South Central, Sinn Fein) | Oireachtas source

This Cabinet committee is tasked with considering health policy, including the Sláintecare report. The joint committee that launched this report aims to reorientate the health service to a universal single tier system. However, the Government's implementation strategy, as we always feared, is not moving the health service to universality. The barriers to care remain sky high. Charges for urgent scheduled care are still in place and the primary and social care ambitions set out by Sláintecare are a pipe dream.

In the first six days of this month, 319 patients were left waiting for a bed at the Cork University Hospital, CUH, 103 at the Mercy Hospital and 29 at Bantry General Hospital. I was in the Mercy Hospital yesterday week with my son and, despite a high standard of care, we could see that the system was under savage pressure. There were many elderly and very ill people on trolleys. Unfortunately, there is a lack of dignity for them. It is a disgraceful situation. There are 36 people waiting on trolleys there today. That is the second highest number in the State. Conor Deasy, of the emergency department in CUH, said that his colleagues had been placed in an impossible situation and that they "abhor the inhumanity, indignity and patient safety risk associated with treating patients, who require an inpatient hospital bed, on the corridor of the emergency department."

The Government has committed to delivering a universal health service over ten years. What focus has the committee given to the roadmap for universal access in its work this year and to the outcomes of the under-resourcing of patient care in all care settings?

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