David Cullinane (Waterford, Sinn Fein) | Oireachtas source

This shows again that it was quite dangerous not to properly fund the health service for next year but also not provide any additional funding for new measures. As I suspected, any additional funding that will come to the national stroke strategy is simply to stand still and is funding for existing levels of service. Some 6,000 people have a stroke every year and 2,000 of them do not get to a stroke unit in the first instance. A further 2,000 are discharged early. We know we have lots of problems. The aim of the stroke strategy is to address the deficits we have. There are about 70 posts that need to be funded and put into the stroke units right across the State. There are posts that are still not funded even from last year. The concern I have is that we have again put a national strategy in place, which everybody welcomed. I welcomed it. Obviously we want the strategy to work and be properly invested in to support stroke patients and provide the funding for prevention but also for treatment. If it is the case that we have not provided enough funding or any new funding for next year, that will have consequences for patients.

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