Comment: Something truly rotten about the provision of healthcare and health services in Ireland

There is something truly rotten about the provision of healthcare and health services in Ireland that surely places it as the number one election issue whenever the politicos in Merrion Street decide to call it.

We have a National Children’s Hospital in an escalating costs death spiral for almost a decade now with deadlines treated with contempt and requests for answers and accountability, with disdain.

The latest revelation in the fiasco that keeps on fiascoing was a letter released by the National Paediatric Hospital Development Board (NPHDB) revealing the “snagging and finish” phase for 3,128 of the hospital’s 5,670 rooms offered as 'complete' - not one single room was to the desired standard.

It is understood that the letter said the board views construction firm BAM’s approach as “based on extracting as much money from the Irish taxpayer as possible” and that this is partly responsible for the delays.

In a statement, BAM rejected the “misleading, ill-informed and incorrect” allegations. What it cannot deny is that the project has gone grotesquely over budget and over deadline for completion in a location that still bewilders the majority of people wondering how they'll ever access the city centre location.

The Department of Health said BAM had attempted to push a previous completion date of February 2025 back further and that according to the development board, BAM had shifted its completion date 14 times since it began work in early 2019.

When it's complete, the new 165,000m² children’s hospital and associated Children’s Research and Innovation Centre should provide a world class facility for children, and young people from all over Ireland, who have complicated and serious illnesses and are in need of specialist and complex care. The overall cost of the project has risen from an estimated €800 million in 2014, to €983 million in 2017, to €1.4 billion as of December 2019 to over €2 billion in 2024 leading to accusations BAM is "extracting as much money from the Irish taxpayer as possible”.

Where is the oversight on who provides our State sponsored infrastructure? We had the Bike Shed nonsense but the NCH puts a saddle on that by some distance.

From healthcare facilities to providing actual individual care, the last few week has been truly shocking.

An independent report found that a “grossly overcrowded” emergency department and “lack of clarity” on sepsis protocols were among the factors ahead of Aoife Johnstone’s death at UHL two years ago. The 16 year-old died at the hospital after waiting for 12 hours to be assessed for suspected sepsis.

The HSE published a report last Friday written by former chief justice Frank Clarke, who described the circumstances around her death as “almost certainly avoidable”.

HSE chief, Bernard Gloucester summed it up when he spoke on RTE radio at the weekend: “We can never tire of saying we failed Aoife, we failed her badly. Our failure caused her death and that has led to the devastation that her family are now left with.”

If that was not enough scandal, last week saw the story of the heartbroken family of a young Dublin boy, whose spine is crushing his lungs and pressing against his heart, saying he will die unless he undergoes vital urgent surgery.

Harvey Sherratt (8), from Clondalkin was born with spina bifida, hydrocephalus and scoliosis and is a “victim” of long waiting lists at Temple Street Children’s Hospital, his parents, Stephen Morrison and Gillian Sherratt said.

The curvature on Harvey’s spine is now somewhere beyond 80 degrees, meaning he is at risk of death unless he receives surgical intervention.

Only in Ireland are patients' spines allowed reached such acute curvatures before surgical intervention. Other countries don't allow the damage to proceed so far.

Inexplicably, Harvey was taken off the CHI active waiting list for surgery, despite three surgeons telling them that Harvey should have surgery to implant growth rods in his spine.

It's another shameful indictment of our health service where once again we stand idly by and let the children suffer.

If the above line sounds familiar to readers, it's because it was used to wrap up last week's Leader column. It's appropriate again this week and one wonders for how many more years to come?

Leader article first published in this week's Meath Chronicle dated 28/09/24