Gino Kenny (Dublin Mid West, People Before Profit Alliance) | Oireachtas source

I acknowledge there has been significant progress in intensive care beds since Covid-19, which exposed crack lines in medical need. Obviously, there is more demand in our public healthcare system because of population growth and so forth. Obviously, not having ICU beds creates a knock-on effect and a trickle-down effect. If there is full capacity at ICU level, that will have a knock-on effect in terms of bringing people out from the ICU into hospital wards.

Another issue to which the audit referred was the staffing of ICU beds. For every ICU bed, six well-trained clinical staff are needed. The audit pointed out that, in order to keep and retain these staff – which is a big issue in our public health system - there must be incentives to keep them. I wish to hear the Minister’s views in that regard.

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