Tag Archives: Clare Deputy Michael McNamara

OVERCROWDING surged again in University Hospital Limerick this week close to record levels following recent calls for an independent inquiry into why this continues to be a problem at the region’s flagship acute hospital. The number of patients on trolleys increased from 63 on Tuesday to 89 on Wednesday after 78 patients were waiting for a bed on Monday, according to the INMO’s Trolley Watch. An Taoiseach Micheál Martin has pledged to ask Health Minister Stephen Donnelly to set up an independent inquiry into chronic overcrowding in University Hospital Limerick (UHL) after two record-breaking days of trolley numbers last week. Surging admissions, which resulted in 97 patients languishing on trolleys in UHL on Tuesday, January 25 and 111 on Wednesday, January 26 have prompted calls for an independent inquiry into overcrowding. Deputy Michael McNamara asked the Taoiseach to commission an official independent inquiry to establish “what is the problem with healthcare in the UHL Hospitals’ Group”. The Taoiseach said there …

HEALTH Minister Stephen Donnelly will be asked by An Taoiseach Micheál Martin to set up an independent inquiry into chronic overcrowding in University Hospital Limerick (UHL) after two record-breaking days of trolley numbers, writes Dan Danaher. Surging admissions, which resulted in 97 patients languishing on trolleys in UHL on Tuesday and 111 on Wednesday, have prompted calls for an independent inquiry into overcrowding. Speaking in the Dáil on Wednesday, Deputy Michael McNamara said the new 96-bed unit will only deliver 48 additional beds as the remaining new beds will replace existing ones. (See Champion story here) “I would accept that any amount of new beds isn’t going to meet the exponential growth in numbers on trolleys in UHL. I don’t know is there a problem with the way admission and discharge is done in the hospital, or one of the other hospitals in the group needs to be upgraded to a Model Three hospital.” I have called for an independent …

ACUTE hospitals in the Mid-West are on the alert for a possible significant surge in Covid-19 cases during the Christmas period due to the increased transmission of the new Omicron variant, writes Dan Danaher. There were 109 new cases of Covid-19 in Clare on Sunday, December 19, 197 in Limerick and 51 in North Tipperary. This compared to 65 new cases in Clare on December 13, 149 in Limerick and 56 in Tipperary. Meanwhile, the 14-day incidence of Covid-19 in Clare has increased slightly from 1,120 per 100,000 on December 13 to 1,133 on December 19. It also went up marginally in Limerick from 913 to 1,024 but fell in Tipperary from 1,441 to 1,322 during the same period. There were 1,331 cases in Clare from November 30 to December 13, 1,780 in Limerick and 2,300 in Tipperary during the same period. The latest 14-day incidence rate from December 6 to December 19 reveal 1,347 new cases in Clare, 1,996 …

DEPUTY Michael McNamara has predicted Clare people will experience another national Covid-19 lockdown this winter following a spiral in confirmed Covid-19 cases, writes Dan Danaher. Speaking to The Clare Champion, Deputy McNamara said he always expected there would be another lockdown after the introduction of the most severe restrictions in Europe during the summer when other countries had deemed this was a time the virus would be less transmissible. The East Clare Deputy criticised the government for not working to find a different alternative to lockdown to protect the country’s struggling health care system. One of the more practical solutions, he said, was to dramatically increase ICU capacity with extra beds and staffing, which wasn’t done in the required numbers. He recalled a major hospital to deal with Covid-19 patients was built in Wuhan, China in 14 days, yet Ireland only followed part of their response in terms of restrictions without properly addressing the chronic shortage of ICU bed capacity. …

NATIONAL ambulance personnel from Clare were in Northern Ireland carrying out Covid-19 testing while an ambulance was sent 175km from Galway to provide treatment to an injured motorcyclist, a local Dáil Deputy has claimed. The lack of ambulance drivers to deal with serious incidents was highlighted in the Dáil recently by Deputy Michael McNamara, who expressed concern about the dispatch of an ambulance from the Carraroe base in County Galway to an incident in Kilkee, two hours away A motorcyclist was hospitalised following the incident which occurred in Kilkee shortly after 4.30pm on Sunday, October 10. The collision, which happened on Gratten Street in the West Clare resort, involved a car and a motorcycle. It is believed there was no National Ambulance Service (NAS) resource available in Clare or Limerick at the time, which resulted in the requirement to draft in an ambulance from Galway to provide the necessary medical assistance. Firefighters from nearby Kilkee fire station were requested to …

BUS Éireann has confirmed there are no current plans to allocate staff to Ennis bus station. The national transport company was responding to a Dáil Question from Independent TD Michael McNamara. The lack of staff at the station had also been raised recently by Councillor Mary Howard who had expressed fear that the station could become a “hotspot of anti-social behaviour”. “It can be a scary place and we want to ensure that we don’t have those issues in Ennis.” Deputy McNamara had asked the Minister for Transport his plans to allocate staff to Ennis bus station “given the very high number of staycations around the county and the lack of services available to them at Ennis bus station.” The Department of Transport referred the question to Bus Éireann which responded, “There are no current plans to allocate staff to the station. “Bus Éireann, is currently working on a nationwide upgrade to all our information displays in stations including Ennis, …

HOPES are high the government will allocate funding to facilitate the planning and design stages for the eagerly-awaited Scariff Regeneration Project, writes Dan Danaher. Clare County Council has lodged a Category 2 application with the Department of Rural and Community Development for funding under the Rural Regeneration Development Fund. If successful, the funding would enable the local authority to proceed with the design and planning stages of the project before submitting a Category 1 funding application to deliver the works. A decision on the application is expected during November. This project has been described by Deputy Michael McNamara as the “biggest infrastructure investment in the town in a generation”. Deputy McNamara this week wrote to Minister for Rural and Community Development, Heather Humphreys TD, to pledge his support for the project. He said it would have “long lasting positive implications for the community and economy of the town and surrounding area”. The Independent Deputy said the proposed delivery of an …

A SIXMILEBRIDGE family has stated the nine-month delay concerning the publication of a state inquiry report into the Garda investigation concerning the death of a deceased 23 year-old banqueting manager “beggars belief”. A spokesperson for the Nugent family has also hit out over the lack of communication with the family, describing it as a “total disregard”. Former Minister for Justice Frances Fitzgerald appointed retired District Court judge Patrick Clyne to lead an inquiry under Section 42 into the Garda investigation and disciplinary inquiries that took place following the death of Patrick Nugent (23) Feenagh, Sixmilebridge at the end of a 40th wedding anniversary party in the early hours of February 11th, 1984. Judge Clyne completed his inquiry on October 31, 2020 and the Department of Justice received this report on November 3, 2020. The family are concerned about repeated delays in publishing a report concerning the inquiry, which started in January 2017. Deputy Michael McNamara has tabled Dáil questions asking …