I thank Deputy Shortall and acknowledge that it was she who called for me to publish the Vision for Change document. We ran the risk of setting up ad hoc structures, special committees and the like, and the Deputy counselled against that. Subject to Government approval today or tomorrow, we will publish that document next week and the Minister of State, Jim Daly, will engage with stakeholders and advocacy groups in advance of publication. The Deputy is right that the next big challenge will be implementation. I pre…

Let us not lose the ones we have. It would be an appropriate recognition of the work they have done. I am in their corner on that and if I have a role to play in the next Government I would like to advocate to make progress there. Deputy Shortall made a fair point on non-consultant hospital doctors. I will discuss that with the HSE. Obviously we made a decision to bring forward a number of graduations to get more medical students into intern years and I will establish the facts on that. In regard to the Intensive C…

I offer my apologies to Deputy Kenny for the fact that we never got to have a debate on Spinraza. I am following up on some of the issues we discussed and which the Deputy raised with me in the House last week. I join with him in extending my sympathies to Melanie and her family and acknowledge the advocacy work he did with her. Perhaps it is a conversation we can pick up at another time and I would welcome that opportunity. The Deputy is quite right to highlight the issue of healthcare workers. They have been at t…

In addition to my meetings, I read at the weekend a comment from the clinical director of BreastCheck in one of our national newspapers outlining her hope that the programme can resume in the autumn. The priority at the moment must be symptomatic people. I urge anyone with a symptom of cancer to come forward. The GP surgeries are open, and the GPs want to see such patients. If it is an emergency, people should call 999. The Deputy is correct in saying we will need extra capacity. We have about 20 BreastCheck mobile…

The Deputy comes into the House and makes valid points as a Member of the Oireachtas, as he has a right, duty and obligation to, and I have an obligation to answer his questions and give my view. I find it very frustrating that he then puts in little loaded terms like "sweetheart deals". We need to remind ourselves what was happening here. I know the further it gets away from that possibility he might hope people will forget, but I do not believe the people of this country will forget. We were looking around the wo…

I would like to create a universal healthcare service in line with Sláintecare. I think the Deputy's group is the only one that possibly has not signed up to Sláintecare. We both agree we need extra capacity, but Deputy Murphy wants me to just go in and take it. I recognise the reality of the world and that we might have to pay for it. The Deputy did not like the deal we had. We ended that deal, and he is not happy now that I am going to do a new deal. We are going to do a new arrangement, and it will be an arrange…

I thank Deputy Naughten for raising this issue, and I will direct the HSE to share with him any information it has. The HSE should do that and it should want to do that, because I believe it did everything it possibly could in this situation. I do not share the Deputy's view that the transfers were done to reduce bed blocking, or any similar phrase. If we think back, there was a view that our hospitals were going to be very dangerous places, and often places where infections would be picked up. The idea, after look…

To be clear, I am told that since 18 May the average wait from swab to result is one to two days, with overall end-to-end turnaround times of within three days. I will share the data I have with the Deputy rather than taking up his time now. He made the very important point that testing is only a point in time. I think he would acknowledge that we have built up a lot of extra capacity that we can put to work in trying to manage and suppress the virus further. The ECDC has issued very important guidance relating to …

In the interests of time, I suggest that I respond to the Deputy in writing on the matters he raised. I am reluctant to disagree with Deputy Naughten because he is often right, as I find out in this House, and he highlighted very important issues here before. My information, for what it is worth, is that when it comes to contact tracing of meat plant staff, and I specifically asked this on foot of contact from the Deputy, the amount of contact tracing is much higher than one third and is between at least 60% and 70…

I thank Deputies Danny Healy-Rae and Michael Collins. Deputy Healy-Rae made a very valid point on nursing home visits. I have been speaking to residents in nursing homes via FaceTime and I know how lonely people are feeling. I know how incredible the staff are in trying to ease that loneliness. I know how relatives go up to the window of a bedroom and phone from outside and have a conversation with their mother or father. People are trying very hard and it is very tough. The visitor restrictions were introduced to …

I thank Deputy McNamara for his questions, for his work on the Covid-19 committee, and for his engagement with my Department and the HSE. I acknowledge that the mid-west has been failed for decades in terms of bed numbers. I am not here to apportion blame either but we all know the story. Changes were made, beds were promised but beds never came. I can go through the list of the beds coming now. I will not do that but a 60-bed modular unit is being built now and there are 48 other beds - 24 now and 24 due to come o…

I agree with the Deputy. The fear of any Minister for Health, including myself or any successive Minister for Health, and the collective concern of this Oireachtas should be that at any moment in time people will decide that the pandemic has passed when it has not. We have to try to get back to living alongside it in a safe way for the sake of the economy and all those important things but we will be in a health emergency for the foreseeable future. We all have to start thinking like that, whatever our political tr…

I move: That, notwithstanding Standing Order 215(1) or (2) of the Standing Orders of Dáil Éireann relative to Public Business, the following Revised Estimate for the Public Services for the year ending 31st December, 2020, be presented to the Dáil and circulated to members on 27th May, 2020, being a date later than that prescribed for the presentation of Estimates: Vote 37 — Employment Affairs and Social Protection (Revised Estimate) .

I very much welcome this opportunity to once again update this House on the Covid-19 disease and our national response to it. First and most important, I wish to express my sympathy to the family and friends of those who have been lost to this disease since I was last in this House. It is important to say that each private loss is also a loss to our country, and we offer our deep and sincere condolences to all those impacted. I am pleased today to be able to report some good news to the Dáil. The modelling data, co…

I watched much of the committee hearing yesterday. It was disappointing that officials from the Department of Health were not invited to a committee hearing on nursing homes. Their ears must have been burning but they were not in a position to speak. Nor were representatives of the HSE invited to give an opening statement setting out what it has been doing. However, be that as it may. Action 4 of the national action plan on Covid, caring for people who are at risk or vulnerable, is all about protecting older and mo…

I will follow up on the issue relating to the healthcare worker. On home care, I am not familiar with the letter but I share the Deputy's view that this is a very nervous time for lots of people, including people deciding whether to resume these services and so on at a time when they are cocooning and that there should be a degree of flexibility and discretion shown. We are eager that people feel comfortable to resume home care again and to have vital supports back in their home but I understand that different peop…

I thank Deputy Calleary for raising the issue and join him in acknowledging the passing of many of our citizens from Covid-19. I often feel somewhat uneasy when we speak about progress in statistics and figures but we are not talking about them in a vacuum. This is a virus that has caused a lot of tragedy to an awful lot of people and we think of them. I thank Deputy Calleary for raising the matters on Mayo hospital. He was in direct contact with me on these issues. I am advised by Saolta hospital group that approp…

I apologise to Deputy Brendan Smith that he did not get his question in but it is hard to answer the many questions from various parties in 15 minutes. I do not make the rules. I thank Deputy O'Reilly for raising those screening matters. I will come back to her directly on the cases she has raised with me. The Office of Government Procurement, OGP, has been considering how to support a co-ordinated approach to the resumption of public sector construction projects. This has resulted in the publication of notes provi…

I thank the Deputy. I extend my sympathies to her cousin on her loss and I thank the Deputy for sharing the text message. I can only imagine what a traumatic time this must be. I understand what the Deputy is saying and I do not want to show a graph or a chart or be cold in my response. These are valid questions. However, I note that the first cluster in a nursing home occurred on 16 March. The first case in Ireland was 29 February. People are now looking back to January and February as though there was a knowledge…

It is not my understanding that Covid was not discussed. In fact, that is the opposite to my understanding from my conversations with the CEO, which is that Covid was discussed.