Micheál Martin (Cork South Central, Fianna Fail) | Oireachtas source

The entire issue with an ICU bed is staff. The ratio of nurses to patients in ICU is 1:1. It is very staff intensive, as it has to be. Therefore, up to 1,500 staff were trained during the pandemic to be ready for a Covid surge and to significantly increase ICU capacity to deal with any further surges. The facility exists within the health service to ramp up critical care capacity, if necessary. There has been an increase in beds since the beginning of the year but we will continue to work on that. I accept the bona fides of the Deputies in asking their questions. A genuine objective of ours is to ensure we have sufficient critical care capacity to deal with the issues.

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