Alan Kelly (Tipperary, Labour) | Oireachtas source

A couple of weeks ago the Taoiseach agreed with me here that the mid-west needed an elective hospital given the massive overcrowding and that University Hospital Limerick, UHL, is simply too small. There are reports in the media that UL Hospitals Group, along with a number of others, has worked with a private organisation, the University of Pittsburgh Medical Center, UPMC, on building an elective hospital in the mid-west. Is this Government policy? Does the Taoiseach believe it should go ahead like that or, given what we have come through collectively in this House as part of Sláintecare, that the elective hospital in question should be publicly-built, publicly-owned and based at one of the health campuses within the mid-west, such as St. John's Hospital, Nenagh or Ennis?

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