Manorhamilton & Sligo Hospitals Endure Further Cutbacks

It appears that yet more hospital cuts are on the way here in the north west. The latest hospital to be targeted by the Health Service Executive (HSE) and their political masters is Our Lady's Hospital in Manorhamilton Co Leitrim.

Over recent years, Our Lady's has already been downgraded significantly, having suffered the loss of a wide range of services previously carried out in the hospital. Amongst the loss of services has been the closure of the Accident & Emergency (A&E) department, the removal of endoscopy and maternity services and the transfer of the orthopaedic unit to Sligo General Hospital (SGH).

Our Lady's Hospital Manorhamilton

The fear of most people in the north Leitrim area, including staff at the hospital, is that the ultimate aim of the HSE is to shut the facility altogether, shutting it down one cutback and downgrade at a time.

When questioned on their plans for the Rheumatology services, the HSE used the dreaded R word saying that they were continuing to “'review' all elements of the Rheumatology service” at Our Lady's. They went on to confirm that what they describe as a “reconfiguration of beds” will take place in the coming months at the hospital admitting that there were plans already underway to transfer acute in-patient Rheumatology services to Sligo General Hospital which is already suffering the brunt of savage cutbacks with yet more planned.

Last year SGH seen the removal of its breast cancer mammography and surgical services to Galway, the closure of its dedicated stroke unit, the loss of 72 beds and the cancellation of all elective surgery for the last two months of the year. Orthopaedic services have also been particularly hard hit. As pointed out at the start of this article, orthopaedic services previously provided in Manorhamilton was transferred to Sligo a number of years back. Now those services in Sligo, which were supposed to cater for Manorhamiltons patients as well, have been stripped to the bone. One of the two orthopaedic wards has already been shut down, with patient capacity reduced from 52 beds to just 18.

Now those 18 beds are being reduced even further to just 12 beds as the hospital  starts to cut back on elective surgery and orthopaedic activity for the rest of the year as part of its cost cutting measures.

In a statement released on August 3^rd this year, the Irish Nurses & Midwives Organisation (INMO) made clear that “the level of cuts, currently being imposed upon our public health service, are compromising patient care, lowering standards and greatly increasing the clinical risk to patients.”

The statement added: “Furthermore frontline nurses and midwives are having their views ignored and every effort they are making, to highlight real and significant risks to patients, are being simply set aside.”

According to éirígí activist Gerry Casey, the HSE and their political masters have decimated services at SGH and Our Lady's in Manorhamilton and put lives at risk in the process.

Casey said: “The HSE and this administration has repeatedly shown a callous disregard for the health and well being of the people of this region and for the public health service in general.”

“What we are seeing is cutback after cutback in essential front line services. The end result is patients on trolleys, longer waiting lists, ill people having to travel long distances to receive treatment, prolonged suffering and lives being placed unnecessarily at risk.”

He added: “As éirígí have repeatedly pointed out, contrary to what the HSE and their political masters would have us believe, the cutbacks are not based on economic necessity. They are instead part of a deliberate strategy of running down and dismantling the public health care system in order to pave the way for the privatisation of our hospitals.”

“Given the choice of protecting the health and well being of the people they claim to represent or bail out the banks, they have shown where their warped priorities lie by taking a conscious decision to pump tens of billions of euros into bailing out the banks while slashing essential health services.”

Casey concluded: “This is a fight that working class communities cannot afford to lose. It is vital that no compromise or 'deals' are made on these cutbacks, in particular from the leadership of the health service Trade Unions. It has been previous such 'deals' that has led our health service to this present crisis. Reducing the level of cutbacks is not a solution - only the ending of the  drive towards privatisation of the public health system and the complete reversal of all cutbacks is acceptable.”

Roscommon Protest against Hospital Cutbacks

Tomorrow morning (Saturday August 14), a demonstration against proposed HSE (Health Service Executive) cutbacks at Roscommon County Hospital is to take place.  The protest march, organised by the Roscommon Health Action Committee (HAC) is to commence at the Hyde Centre in Roscommon town at 11am tomorrow morning and will proceed from there to the hospital itself, where a ‘Hands Around Our Hospital Protest’ will take place.

Like other hospitals throughout the region, Roscommon's has already suffered severe cutbacks and is bracing itself for more in the imminent future, including the possible closure of the hospital completely.

Roscommon County Hospital

A report commissioned earlier this year by the HSE West recommended the closure of the hospital.  Ironically, it transpires that the cost of having that report commissioned cost the HSE a massive €90,000, money which IMPACT Trade Union say could have kept 12 nurses or clerical staff employed from now until the end of the year.

Urging people throughout the West and Midlands to support Saturday's march, éirígí activist Gerry Casey said that there must be no compromise or backing down by the Unions in relation to the proposed cutbacks in the HSE West region.

Casey said:  "What is at stake here is of vital importance for future generations.  The planned cutbacks are not about reducing services or even closing hospitals due to necessity.  It is part of a planned strategy by the HSE, on behalf of the Fianna Fáil /Green party coalition to run down the public health service in order to pave the way for the privatisation of our hospitals and our health care system."

He added:  "The current health system we have is a medical form of apartheid where the wealthy get treated whenever they want, while those reliant on the public health service have to join ever lenghtening queues to receive essential treatment.  Such a system ensures that people suffer needlessly and die needlessly."  

"The release this week by the Irish Cancer Society (ICS) of figures showing the continued increase in the numbers waiting more than three months for a potentially life saving colonoscopy, is yet more evidence of the danger to life posed by the HSE and this administrations health policies.  People should be under no illusion.  Lives have been lost as a result of cutbacks and even more will be lost if they get to impose new cutbacks"

Casey continued:  "Mary Harney and her cronies in government peddle the lie that they have not the finance to properly fund our health service and that cutbacks are unavoidable.   But the bottom line is, as éirígí have repeatedly pointed out, that none of these cutbacks are in any way necessary.  Imposition of a wealth tax, the nationalisation of our natural resources and the proper distribution of the current finances at the governments disposal, would allow not just for a halt to any cutbacks, but also for a reversal of those already imposed and more importantly for proper new investment to be made to create an efficient public service available to all, based solely on medical need and not based on ability to pay." 

"Fianna Fáil and the Green Party have pumped tens of billions of euros into bailing out the banks and developers.  This is money that could have been used to fund our hospitals and invest in their future.  Given the choice of protecting the health and welfare of patients who rely on the public health care system or protecting the excessive living standards of the wealthy political and business elite, the coalition chose the latter."

"This is a fight that we cannot afford to lose.  There can be and must be no compromise or 'deals' on these cutbacks particularly from the leadership of the Trade Unions within the health service.  Reducing the cutbacks is not a solution - only the scrapping and reversal of cutbacks is acceptable.   Previous 'deals' have led us to this point.  As the INMO (Irish Nurses & Midwives Organisation) General secretary pointed out recently: 'The INMO voted against the Croke Park proposals primarily on the basis that they require 6,000 posts to be taken out of our health service in a haphazard, uncontrolled and unplanned manner with scant regard for the impact upon patients and their needs and requirements.  We are now seeing the real impact of this flawed approach.'"

Casey concluded:  "Support tomorrows (Saturday August 14) march and rally in Roscommon town and all similar protests against the proposed cutbacks.  Send the message to Leinster House - Fund our Hospitals, Not the Banks."

No Private Hospitals – Fund our Public Hospitals: Health Crisis is "Deliberately Manufactured"

The most recent General Purposes meeting of Sligo Borough Council on July 19 heard proposals to build yet another private hospital in Sligo. Planning permission has been sought to develop the hospital on a site just off the N4 at the Summerhill Roundabout on the approach to the town centre.

This is the third such proposal in recent times. Last year it was announced that plans are underway to build a  €50 million private hospital right next to the existing Sligo General Hospital, while plans are also afoot to develop another such hospital at Carraroe.

Site of proposed new Private Hospital

All of this comes at a time when services at Sligo General Hospital are being slashed with further savage cutbacks already on their way.  Last year seen a dramatic reduction in services, including the removal of vital Cancer services to Galway, the downgrading of the Stroke Unit, the shutdown of wards and the closure of 78 beds.

The figures for the number of people left waiting on trolleys in Sligo General Hospital betweeen January and May of this year stood at a staggering 876.  Compared to the same period in 2007, the figure has more than doubled, up a massive increase of 419 people from 357.

As previously reported here, the Regional Director of Operations for HSE West John Hennessy confirmed in recent weeks that this year the Hospital was facing a budget deficit of €12 million and would mean new cutbacks which he admitted would impact on essential frontline services and would include yet more bed closures.  Amongst the measures he indicated were on the way were a ban on purchasing  equipment for the remainder of 2010 and the introduction of 5-day wards.

In the latest development at the hospital, staff were informed on Tuesday (July 27) that another eleven nursing positions were to go, a move that the INMO (Irish Nurses & Midwives Organisation) have said will have a "devestating impact" on essential frontline services.  According to the INMO spokesperson, the proposed cuts would decimate services at the hospital.

Impact trade union have said that among the other measures to be implemented by the HSE will be a further 60 bed closures as well a significant reduction in drug stock levels.  The HSE are also planning to alter the fixed term contracts of 25 employees.  According to IMPACT, in some instances this will result in workers having their weekly hours reduced from 35 hours to as little as eight hours per week

Reacting to the HSE's plans, IMPACT's Richy Carrothers has said that among the many areas affected will be essential radiology and oncology services.   In relation to the cuts in workers hours he said that "a reduction in the number of working hours, on the scale proposed, would devastate the lives of these workers."

He added:  “Reducing working time to just eight hours per week would mean that these workers, who are engaged in delivering vital services in the North West, could not earn a living wage, and would have to join the other reported 3000 public servants whose incomes are so low that they would have to claim family income support (FIS) from the state.”

Further north at Letterkenny General Hospital, the news appears to be even worse.  It is believed that up to 120 jobs are to go as well as the closure of the hospitals orthapaedic ward and it's medical rehabilitation unit.  Day services are also set to be reduced and all elective surgery is to be cancelled for the remainder of this year.

Responding to the latest proposed cutbacks and HSE nationwide figures which reveal that around 2000 nursing and midwifery posts have been lost since the introduction of the moratorium on recruiting nurses and midwives, the INMO described the current situation as "unsafe and unworkable".  The end result of this ban on recruitment is "longer waiting times for public patients for services, overcrowded hospitals with less inpatient beds, overworked staff and increased risks to both patients and staff" according to the INMO. 

At Belmullet District Hospital in County Mayo, the recruitment ban has resulted in ten of the hospitals forty beds lying idle as they have not the staff to cater for them.

Now the Dublin government, and Mary Harney in particular, are flagging up even more savage cuts in health care in the upcoming budget.  According to Harney the budget cuts in Health will be "substantial" and have "serious consequences for the health service".  This weeks Sunday Tribune reported that those cuts are likely to be as high as €700 million.

Once again, not only will patients suffer  and indeed die from the reduction in quantity and quality of service, but Harney has also revealed that the HSE would be focusing on changes in work practices and conditions within in the health service.  If the government get their way, it is front line staff, already  dangerously overworked and overstretched due to previous cutbacks resulting in increased workloads, who will have their already inadequate and unacceptable working conditions worsen.

And we know our health service is in deep crisis, but it is a deliberately manufactured crisis, one created by deliberate political decisions taken by successive Fianna Fáil led administrations.  What we have witnessed in recent years, and this blog has repeatedly reported on, has been the systematic stripping down and removal of services from Sligo General Hospital and other hospitals around the country.

This has not been accidental or forced upon the 26 county government by forces beyond their control.  Make no mistake about it.  This is ideology driven, pure and simple.  It is part of a deliberate strategy of running down the public health care system and increasingly privatising all aspects of health care, including our hospitals.

Fianna Fáil and the Greens are using the current economic crisis, brought about by a combination of greed and corruption by the wealthy political and business elite as a smokescreen for implementing these cuts and their real agenda, which is about privatising the public healthcare system.

 
Despite the Dublin government's claims, there is no excuse for cutting funding and services for hospitals. The money to properly fund our health service is there, only they believe spending tens of billions on bank bailouts and up to €10 million on bringing the English Monarch here, are more important than spending on people's health - well on working people's health anyway.

At the time of last years budget, Finance Minister Brian Lenihan attempting to justify his savage cutbacks said that there was "no pot of gold that can be raided from the wealthy that can solve our difficulties”. What he said then was untrue and remains so today.  The business elite in this country, who amassed billions of euros on the backs of workers throughout the so-called 'Celtic Tiger', remain wealthy individuals.  Indeed, despite the economic recession, the richest people in this country have got even richer.

There are also hundreds of billions of euro worth of oil and gas lying under the seabed off the Irish coast, the rights to these resources shamefully given away to multi-national corporations such as Shell, by previous Fianna Fáil-led administrations.  Those natural resources could and should be nationalised at the stroke of a pen.

Yet Lenihan and his cronies in the Fianna Fáil/Green Party coalition have taken deliberate political decisions not to nationalise these natural resources and not to make the rich pay.  Instead they are content to reduce the incomes of low paid workers and welfare recipients and slash essential health and education services.

So is there a solution?  Of course there is - but that solution is not in private hospitals. They have no place in the provision of health care. Private companies mean a hospitals priority is creating profit for shareholders, rather than patient care.

Private hospitals and private health care are also clearly not in the interests of working people, both those that use and need our health service and those that work within it.  Ironically the site of this new proposed private hospital is located adjacent to St Joseph's private hospital, the owners of which, the Mount Carmel Medical Group, in the past week have claimed an inability to pay redundancy in the region of €400,000 as recommended by the Labour Court to their former workers.

St Josephs Hospital

What we currently have in this state is a form of medical apartheid.  Those who can afford to pay, get their treatment when they seek it.  Those who cannot afford to pay are forced to endure lengthy waiting times for treatment that they may need right away.  The increased numbers of people waiting more than three months for a colonoscopy  (see here for previous story on Colonoscopy waiting lists) is just one example of how an essential procedure that could save a persons life is denied for lengthy periods to those who cannot afford to go private.  The end result of these delays for many people is quite often completely unnecessary suffering and death.

This two-tier apartheid system is completely unacceptable and needs to be dismantled immediately.  Health care is a basic human right - not a privilege - that must be free, easily accessable by all and must be completely under public control. Patients must be treated based on their medical need, not their ability to pay as things currently stand.