Mary Butler (Waterford, Fianna Fail) | Oireachtas source

I will answer the Deputy's question about nursing homes. The Deputy is right that the past 12 months have been very difficult for anyone with a family member in a nursing home. As we know, the pandemic has borne down hard on the nursing home sector. Christmas week was the most recent time that anybody was able to visit a loved one in a nursing home, other than on compassionate or critical grounds. The preceding opportunity to visit was a couple of months earlier. I accept and acknowledge that it has been difficult. The HSE will report to NPHET today on a loosening of restrictions. I urge caution because, as of yesterday, we still have 104 nursing homes out of 580 with an outbreak. Admittedly, the scale of the outbreaks is smaller and many of the nursing homes are coming out of significant outbreaks that occurred over the past few months. We will have to urge caution but the Minister and I would love to see movement on this issue.

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