A 10 per cent cutback in activity levels and services at the Mater Hospital, Dublin, was announced yesterday in an effort to curb its mounting financial crisis.
The reduction will include a ban on filling vacancies, recruitment and training and be the equivalent of losing 50 beds. Only last Friday a 22-bed unit was closed at the hospital.
Staff and union representatives were briefed by the hospital's CEO, Mr Martin Cowley, at a meeting yesterday.
Health professionals and patients' representatives reacted angrily to the announcement.
Last night a joint statement was issued by the Eastern Region Health Authority (ERHA) and the five Dublin Academic Teaching Hospitals (DATHs). It said there would be a reduction in some services, but €1.167 billion had been invested and an additional €6 million was being provided for cancer services.
The assistant general secretary of the Irish Hospitals Consultants' Association (IHCA), Mr Donal Duffy, described the cut-backs as outrageous. He said the Mater had received €155 million last year and the same this year. The costs last year were €156 million, and had run over to €173 million this year so they were €18 million short of what was needed.
"A 10 per cent cut in activity levels for this year is exceedingly serious. They have not yet decided where the cutbacks will come, but I would estimate that a 10 per cent cutback is the equivalent of closing 50 beds this year," Mr Duffy said.
He pointed out that if a 10 per cent cutback was replicated nationally, it would mean 85,000 people not obtaining procedures and would be the equivalent of two general and one national hospital closing.
"It's going to be a bleak year for the Mater. It's a financial problem and needs to be sorted out by the Ministers for Finance and Health and the ERHA," Mr Duffy said.
The general secretary of the Irish Nurses' Organisation (INO), Mr Liam Doran, said that already there were 45 nursing vacancies which would not be filled. There would also be a ban on agency nurses and locums.
The INO yesterday sought an immediate meeting of a high-level health service group, comprising senior union and management officials, in order to discuss the implications for staff and services of the cutbacks now being tabled by a growing number of employers.
"The INO does not accept that it is either tenable or feasible to suggest that hospitals in the greater Dublin area can close beds and lay off staff in the context of the ever-increasing levels of demand with overcrowding in A&E and other departments," Mr Doran said.
The chairman of the Irish Patients' Association, Mr Stephen McMahon, said they had heard yesterday they were to meet the Minister for Health next Thursday week.
"When we meet the Minister it will give him an opportunity to explain to us why the money has gone out of the system and is affecting patient care. This is a very serious issue and there is now a major crisis," he said.
"There is a clear and present danger to patients, and the situation needs urgent intervention at the highest level of Government," Mr McMahon said.
The statement by the EHRA and the DATHs hospitals, Tallaght, Beaumont, Mater, St James's and St Vincent's, was issued after a meeting on Monday which included Department of Health officials.
It said the ERHA and the five hospitals were at an advanced stage in an agreed process to establish the levels of activity which the hospitals could commit to for the allocated funding this year.
The EHRA was anxious to complete discussions with the DATHS hospitals and the other 34 provider agencies within the next three weeks.
The authority had additional money available this year for cancer, cardiology and renal services and at a minimum there would be protection within the system for these three specialities at the 2002 approved levels.