Darren O'Rourke (Meath East, Sinn Fein) | Oireachtas source

What I am hearing from the Minister is that he is not happy with the way these changes are being implemented. He said it is not acceptable for the changes to happen in the manner reported but ultimately what I am hearing is that the destination is the same. The accident and emergency department and ICU in Navan are going to close. It is only a matter of when. We might have the opportunity now, on the back of the Minister's intervention, to do a bit of talking about it but we will stand before clinical leaders and they will tell us why these changes need to happen. It is fundamentally the wrong basis for the conversation because at the root of this is a chronic under-investment in our acute hospital system, ICUs, accident and emergency departments and elsewhere. It is very real. There are solutions to address real clinical concerns that do not involve the closure of the accident and emergency department and ICU.

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