Seán Crowe (Dublin South West, Sinn Fein) | Oireachtas source

This week, HSE officials were before the Joint Committee on Health regarding the challenges facing many emergency departments across the State. It was a valuable meeting that served to highlight the damage that failure to invest in hospital capacity, primary and community care and workforce planning has done to our health service. I made the point, and it has been reiterated tonight, that it is frustrating for many people to be told go to their GP. In many cases, people do not have a GP or they cannot get to GP when there is a difficulty. When is the best time to get sick? It is certainly not on a weekend, certainly not at Christmas and certainly not on a long weekend. There are challenges within the system.

I made the point that my big worry is that many people who are seriously ill will not go to an emergency department. I also made the point that many years ago, when I had sepsis, I was not going to go to an emergency department. Fortunately, I was persuaded by my wife to go along and I would not be here today only I did that. I appeal to people, despite all the challenges they are facing in emergency departments, that they need to go if they are feeling sick and they should send a loved one there if that is needed. I can understand if they are immunocompromised, elderly or seriously ill that it is the last place they want to go, but it is the right path for them and their families.

I am old enough to remember that, when the then Taoiseach, Enda Kenny, was making his 2011 election speech, he said we would end the scandal of patients on trolleys. We are further away from that 12 years later.

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