Independent Tipperary Councillor Seamie Morris is vowing to continue to seek answers as to why the acute health care service in the Mid West is what he terms “broken and pulling down other parts of the healthcare service”.
The Councillor supports the campaign for improved “Accident & Emergency style services” at hospitals such as Nenagh, St Johns in Limerick and Ennis due to chronic overcrowding and poor experiences for many patients at UHL. Today there are 87 patients on trolleys in UHL. The Councillor asked all five Tipperary TD to submit 4 Parliamentary Questions to the Minster for Health.
The councillor is querying who made the decision to close the A & E service in Nenagh, St John’s and Ennis hospitals in 2009 when the required 600 acute beds for the population of 350,000 in the Mid West were not in place at University Hospital Limerick(UHL). The Councillor says the population is now 430,000 and here are only 530 beds in place although more are in the pipeline with 96 extra acute beds to be delivered next year at UHL
The Councillor also says the Mid West Region is being neglected – pointing to the lack of additional funding under the HSE Winter Plan for Winter 2022. In December 2022 and January 2023 UHL suffered severe overcrowding leading to the hospital declaring a major incident and pausing all but the most urgent ambulance deliveries to the hospital. The hospital secured €5.2 million this year to hire 51 additional medial staff to expand the operation of Medical Assessment Units (available only by GP referral) at the 3 smaller hospitals to alleviate the pressure on UHL. The Minister responded to 2 of the 4 questions and says the Government remains committed to improving services in Limerick and the Midwest region.
