IMO conference: In an unprecedented move, the Minister for Health, Mr Martin, has issued a direct threat to striking senior public health doctors during a speech to the annual general meeting of the Irish Medical Organisation.
Emphasising he believed lives were at risk as a result of the doctors' action, he said: "The total abandonment of responsibility by senior staff in the health system is a new departure and one that will need some reflection in thinking through the reclassification of functions in the [future] restructuring of the health service."
Clearly annoyed by the Minister's threat, doctors at the a.g.m. suspended standing orders and unanimously passed an emergency motion deploring the threat made by him to the posts of nine identifiable members of the IMO.
Mr Martin's speech had earlier referred to "senior practitioners who have accepted posts in positions of leadership and authority as directors of public health or of specialist agencies such as the National Disease Surveillance Centre".
Senior public health doctors were visibly shocked by the threat and immediately received vocal support from the IMO's consultant, GP and NCHD craft groups.
The doctors affected include Dr Darina O Flanagan, director of the NDSC, Dr Pat Doorley, director of public health at the Midland Health Board, and Dr Kevin Kelliher, director of public health at the Mid-Western Health Board. Dr Fenton Howell, past president of the IMO and chairman of ASH, the anti-smoking lobby group, is another prominent doctor threatened by the Minister.
Sources in the IMO told The Irish Times it was now likely that the dispute would be escalated next week. "We will not be backing down after the unprecedented abuse we received today," one said.
At a press conference held after his speech, Mr Martin did not rule out the possibility that senior public health doctors could be in breach of Medical Council ethical guidelines.
However, IMO sources said they were confident that in the unlikely event of a formal complaint of professional misconduct being laid before a striking doctor, it would be rejected by the fitness to practise committee of the Medical Council.
Calling on public health doctors to exempt SARS from their industrial action, Mr Martin said: "I am pessimistic at this stage about the strike being called off".
Earlier, the Minister told doctors that it was a matter of considerable personal and corporate regret to him that both the IMO and the Department of Health found itself in the position they did.
Emphasising that health service managers were ready to return to the Labour Court, he said: "My final word to you today is to appeal to you, not on my own or my departments behalf, but in the interest of the health of our population to reconsider your position and to signal your acceptance of the National Implementation Body's invitation [to talks]."