Emer Higgins (Dublin Mid West, Fine Gael) | Oireachtas source

Since June I have raised the cancellation of public health nurse check-ups for babies and children in community healthcare organisation, CHO, 7 and in particular the areas of Rathcoole, Lucan, Clondalkin and Newcastle. I have been told repeatedly that the HSE has a pipeline of students due to graduate who will become public health nurses. However, this has not materialised. In particular, it has not materialised for us in Dublin. That means parents are still stressed out about this and children and toddlers are still missing milestone developmental checkups. It is simply not good enough. Will the Taoiseach commit to looking at the recruitment process to see if policies and procedures need to be changed so that we can get public health nurses more quickly, especially into Dublin, because something has to change?

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