My Disappointment. @HSELive @DonnellyStephen @SusanMitchell_ @ciarakellydoc @merrionstreet
1/ Maybe it’s just Covid lockdowns and 2020 in general but there is at present a greater attention and focus on how we do things in Ireland

2/ How we build hospitals, how we build houses, how we care for the elderly and vulnerable. It’s disappointing how much our government focuses on smoke and mirrors. Deflection and delays. Right hand not knowing what the left hand is doing.

3/ Our Taoiseach didn’t hear about the contact tracing problems until the media reported it. The mother and baby homes commission was established 5 years ago, now the records will be sealed for 30 years.

4/ The cervical cancer debacle, more disappointment and anger. A tragic nursing home Covid 19 outbreak, an exhausted crying owner feeling abandoned by @hselive. Cancer screenings cancelled.

5/ These are not solely Covid issues. They’ve been there for decades. “Unforeseen circumstances”, “winter plans”, “reports”, “tribunals”, “committees”, it goes on and on. The state has employed nearly 25000 more healthcare workers in the last 7 years.

6/ We spend more per capita on our healthcare system than almost every other country in the world (we are the 3rd highest spender on healthcare in the world!). What do we have to show for it - the longest waiting lists in the history of the nation.

7/ In the last 10 years we have increased our health spend by nearly a 1/3rd . But there has been no increase in procedural or surgical output. I fully sympathise with all of my colleagues working in the public system as I did for 20 years.

8/ Whatever masses of the annual budget (almost 1/8th of the country’s annual spend goes to the healthcare system), those on the frontline can’t see it. No access to diagnostics, no step down facilities, no inpatient beds, no theatre slots, trolley crises, swamped EDs.

9/ Why do we accept a narrative from officials which is sugar coated and spin filled. Things are what they are. Is it not time to stop throwing more money at the problem and look instead at how the money is being spent, is it value for the taxpayer.

10/ @ProfJohnCrown has said it for many years and I agree with him fully- the system is malfunded.

11/ Because at present, someone is doing well from the massive spending on health, but it isn’t the patient, nor the HCWs.