Fergus O'Dowd (Louth, Fine Gael) | Oireachtas source

The appalling rape of a number of women in a HSE-run nursing home has shocked the nation. Why is the Government failing to protect people? A total of 978 incidents were reported to HIQA in 2022 in relation to the care and welfare of older people in nursing homes and other institutions but HIQA has no regulatory remit to investigate or manage any of those individual complaints. The Minister is well aware of this but to date, he has refused to introduce legislation to protect our older people.

In this particular case extremely vulnerable older women were living in fear and dread in the middle of the Covid pandemic, when an evil perpetrator was on the loose in a nursing home. It appears that there are files which show that other women in that institution were also raped. Safeguarding must be our top priority. We must stop paying lip service to our older people and protect them utterly and absolutely.

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