Mary Lou McDonald (Dublin Central, Sinn Fein)
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588. To ask the Minister for Health to provide in tabular form the number of people working in the Department’s press office; communications team; and social media team. [52783/22]

Stephen Donnelly (Wicklow, Fianna Fail)
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There are currently 12officials working full time in my Department's Press and Communications office. The details requested by the Deputy are set out below:

Duties carried out by the staff of the Press and Communications office include:

- Preparing / writing / editing and issuing press releases and speeches about the work of the Department and the Minister for Health, the Minister of State with responsibility for Mental Health and Older People, the Minister of State with responsibility for Public Health, Wellbeing and the National Drugs Strategy and the Minister of State with responsibility for Disability.

- Organising press briefings, media events and photocalls.

- Responding to media queries by phone, email, and letter.

- Developing and implementing communications campaigns.

- Collaborating and coordinating communications with colleagues across the health service, including the Health Service Executive (HSE), the seven Hospital Groups (HG) and the Community Healthcare Organisation's (CHO) communication teams.

- Managing the Department’s social media channels and content, providing videography production for the Department of Health and assisting with the maintenance of the Departmental website.

- Establishing and maintaining good relationships with journalists and the Government Information Service (GIS).

- Providing a news monitoring service for the Department of Health.

- Supporting and facilitating information sharing with Department of Health colleagues and other Government Departments.