DOCTOR AND Fine Gael TD Leo Varadkar has claimed the Health Service Executive (HSE) will shortly significantly reduce services at Connolly Hospital Blanchardstown – in a move which he described as “crazy”.
Mr Varadkar has claimed that “major cutbacks include month-long closures of medical and surgical wards this summer and a ban on repairing non-essential equipment”. Such changes will be introduced to “save a few hundred thousand euro” he said and patients will suffer.
“The cutbacks are being instigated to ensure that the hospital does not go over budget, as the HSE and Health Minister Mary Harney have made it clear the hospital will get no additional funding in 2008,” he said.
The Dáil deputy, who represents the Dublin west area, said staff had informed him of management plans for the hospital during recent days. He had worked at the facility as a doctor in 2004-2005.
He said no decision had been officially announced by the HSE, but said such proposals were not “a secret” locally.
The measures, he said, also include the closure of most of the outpatient clinics for two weeks in summer and also in December. “While outpatient clinics normally close for a few days over the Christmas period, they have never closed for two whole weeks,” said Mr Varadkar.
The HSE would not comment when contacted yesterday. However, a HSE source said all hospitals must stay within budget and that during the summer some procedures are “scaled back”, but this would not affect emergency or other key care areas.
According to Mr Varadkar: “These are the worst hospital cutbacks since the 1980s. But like most cost-cutting decisions made in the health service, these cuts represent a false economy. The Government has spent tens of millions of euro building new wards in the Connolly Hospital and has spent millions more hiring seven new consultants. Now, in order to save a few hundred thousand euros, these wards will be closed and consultants will not be able to see new patients. It’s crazy.
“There is an overwhelming need for fundamental reform and renewal in the health sector. The State must move away from the Soviet socialist-style command-and-control structure of the HSE to a modern insurance-based system. Without real and fundamental reform, the situation will only get worse and worse,” he said.