Erin McGreehan (Fianna Fail)
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I welcome the Minister of State. It is good to see her in the House. I thank her for the opportunity to raise this issue, which many people have been contacting me about in recent days and weeks. Indeed, many of my colleagues across all parties have been raising it as well. I must stress the disbelief I felt when I heard that the Covid centre in Dundalk was to close and that Ardee was to become the testing hub for Louth. The county has the two largest towns in the country and neither town will have a Covid testing centre. This comes at a time when the electoral area of Dundalk-Carlingford has, unfortunately, one of the highest rates of Covid in the country, with a 14-day average of 132 per 100,000. The HSE has closed the testing centre in Muirhevnamor in Dundalk and the new testing centre will be located in St. Brigid's in Ardee, which is 25 km away. To me and most of the population in north Louth, this does not make any sense. According to a recent statement issued by the HSE, the move is due to an assessment of locations undertaken as part of the HSE test and trace operational model. Ardee was found to best meet the criteria for a testing centre in Louth as travel times from both Dundalk and Drogheda are less than 25 minutes. I feel the rationale the HSE is using is very narrow.

I absolutely accept the HSE's assertion that the hospital in Ardee will provide fit-for-purpose facilities and when fully operational will provide increased capacity. It will be a great service for the geographical area it practically serves. However, this new location will mean that people from Dundalk and north Louth will have to travel further if they are referred for testing. Someone living in Omeath in north County Louth will have to make a round trip of over 90 km. When we are supposed to be limiting our movements and contacts, it does not really make sense for the HSE to send people on a 90 km trip. A person from north Louth going to Ardee might need to take a toilet break, for example, and will use public facilities, possibly putting other people at risk. The people of Dundalk, who could have gone to a testing centre minutes from their homes, are now travelling with symptoms to Ardee, a town with low numbers of Covid cases and a 14-day average of 27.6 per 100,000. While the testing centre is welcome for Ardee and its surrounds, it is impractical for the citizens of north Louth, especially considering the high incidence of cases in north Louth.

It often seems that the Border region and Border towns are overlooked and this has to end. The Border has been there for 100 years now and it is time to remember these inhabitants. We have problems with many health services. It could take eight hours to get an ambulance to north Louth as well. This lack of thought regarding the location of the Border needs to change.

Mary Butler (Waterford, Fianna Fail)
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I am taking this question on behalf of the Minister for Health, Deputy Stephen Donnelly. I thank the Senator for asking this particular question. As today is our first day since the whole country entered into level 3, it is very timely. A comprehensive, reliable and responsive testing and tracing operation is central to our public health strategy for containing and slowing the spread of Covid-19. Capacity is in place to test 15,000 people a day and overall the system is working well. Rigorous contact tracing, automatic testing of close contacts, serial testing in high-risk environments and large-scale testing in outbreak situations means we are proactively finding more cases than we would have previously. In recent weeks, we have increased resources significantly as demand has increased. We are testing more people than ever before, especially in the community, with over 93,000 people swabbed in the last week. This included the opening of additional community testing centres and mobile pop-up testing units, significantly increased contact tracing teams and increased laboratory testing.

A new static testing and swabbing centre in Ardee commenced operations yesterday, 6 October, and together with the facility in Slane is offering test appointments to members of the public from Louth and Meath seven days a week. Combined, they offer in excess of 750 appointments daily. The Ardee centre replaces the previous temporary centre in Dundalk. Ardee is the default location for appointments for those referred from Louth. If there are capacity issues in Ardee, the centre in Slane will come into play. However, capacity in Ardee will ultimately be approximately 50% higher than the previous Dundalk facility so it is not forecast that this will happen.The HSE advises that current demand nationally and also in the Louth and Meath centres is being met and at present there are no plans for a pop-up testing centre in Drogheda. However, referral demand in any area is subject to ongoing review by the HSE and evaluation against available capacity. This includes actions such as extending opening hours and adding testing stations to existing sites.

The increased capacity in Louth is a clear example of the response to demand being actioned. For example on 16 September, 761 appointments were offered across the two Louth and Meath facilities, whereas two weeks previously, those centres offered a combined 450 appointments per day, approximately. In the last seven days in the entire CHO 8 area, 57% of referrals were offered a same-day appointment with a further 40% getting an appointment the next day. This represents a median time of six hours from referral to appointment.

The HSE is now finalising a future model for testing and tracing. This will aim to deliver a patient-centred, accessible, consistent and flexible service. It includes recruitment of a permanent workforce which has already commenced and a range of other service improvements which will be rolled out quickly. Transition to the new model is under way and will continue through the autumn. As part of this transition a comprehensive assessment of community testing and swabbing locations is being undertaken by the HSE. The executive is examining the suitability and sustainability of the locations as long-term testing centres as well as travel times to test centres.

I take on board the points Senator McGreehan made about people travelling, with some facing a 90 km round trip to certain facilities. The HSE is constantly seeking to improve the responsiveness of the testing and tracing system and will keep demand and capacity under review.

Erin McGreehan (Fianna Fail)
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I thank the Minister of State and I accept that there has been a great increase in the availability of testing. The main problem with the testing in Ardee is not the capacity or sustainability, or the service itself, but the fact that it is so far away from a lot of the constituents of north Louth. I will not be satisfied until there is a testing centre in Dundalk, which is the main town in County Louth. I accept that the testing service is excellent but it does not have the geographic spread required to suit the people of north Louth.

Mary Butler (Waterford, Fianna Fail)
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I thank the Senator again. As I stated earlier, the HSE advises that it is currently meeting all testing demand nationally and across the end-to-end tracing process, with adequate swabbing and laboratory capacity. The HSE has had capacity to conduct approximately 100,000 tests since May, about 30% of which was off-shore. However, over the summer months, it has built laboratory capacity up to 100,000 per week on the island. In addition, the HSE has added surge capacity of 2,000 per day from its German laboratory partner.

I appreciate the constructive way in which Senator McGreehan has raised this matter and take on board the points she has made. She has acknowledged that the centre in Ardee is working very well and that there is sufficient capacity there. The issue is the distance people from north County Louth have to travel to reach the centre and I will relay her concerns in this regard to the Minister for Health.