Sinn Féin TD for Dublin South-West Seán Crowe TD has said that the Government’s failure to address the ongoing trolley crises is ‘failing the public’.

Speaking tonight, Teachta Crowe said:

“I have received information that last Thursday security entered the paediatric ED in Tallaght Hospital and prevented access to an area called ‘the pod’.

“Management then arrived and informed the staff that the area was being re-designated to adult. The staff protested and were effectively bullied away and had to complete the day without the space.

“Some were told that it was a 2 day trial, but others were told to plan for the permanent re-designation.

“During the re-designation I received reports that some extremely sick children were brought to hospital and there was no space for them – including potential cancer and sever neurological patients.

“Other sick children were then shunted out to public thoroughfares and in one case a 5 year old on a drip sitting on a chair in the main corridor of the department.

“Minister, can you confirm if these reports are accurate?

“Children and adult patients are separated for good reason, least of all because paediatric medicine is a separate discipline to adult medicine.

“The HSE charter on children’s hospital care stipulates that children and young people ‘shall be treated with dignity and respect, tact and understanding at all times’ and that ‘the protection of the privacy of children and young people shall be secured at all times’.

“I severely doubt that sharing a specialised children’s ward with adult patients constitutes dignity, respect, or privacy for children and their families.

“So far, the response to the trolley crisis has been to move patients to private hospitals and into beds on children’s wards.”

ENDS