One of the leading campaigners in Monaghan – where a similar campaign to the Portlaoise Hospital Action committee ran to save local services – has warned of “needless deaths” if the downgrade in Portlaoise is allowed to happen.
Secretary of the Portlaoise group John Hanniffy has accused the HSE “of pre-maturely rolling out re-configuration plans despite the fact that they have yet to conduct robust research on the impact of those plans being implemented in a number of cases”.
This statement comes on the back of correspondence received from Peadar McMahon, chairman of the Monaghan Community Alliance.
“This letter laid out very real, very grave outcomes of a successful attempt to downgrade Monaghan Hospital. It is a very difficult read,” Mr Hanniffy said.
“Mr McMahon warns MRHP about the potential of: further over-crowding; longer delays; longer surgical waiting lists; longer journey time to hospitals; unacceptable ambulance waiting times. He warns of needless deaths!” he said.
Chairman of the Portlaoise group, Thomas Timmons stated: “Mr McMahon’s words shine a blinding light on how people’s lives have been unnecessarily risked.
Warning
“The letter acts as a stark warning to all those who depend on MRHP for their lives, to not accept the shiny rhetoric and empty promises of the HSE. He warns us to not believe the claims that MRHP will still thrive and that people’s lives won’t be affected or lost.”
Mr Hanniffy added: “The assertions made in this letter highlight the necessity for an independent investigation to be conducted into the actual impact of such a downgrade upon people. This is a fairly basic but highly important part of the change process”.
They claim there appears to be a failure to plan systematically for the evaluation of the impact of change implementation.
“The HSE ‘appears’ to be intent on rolling out changes nationwide, without analysing the impact first. This is negligent!” he said.
The committee PRO Eimear Holland criticised the logic: “in the same way that they failed to consult with stakeholders, it is obvious that they failed to consult with independent policy experts”.
“Perhaps they were so determined to push re-configuration through, that they did not want a policy expert telling them that they should not plan to move past a pilot study to analyse impact before rolling plans out further.
“Perhaps they knew that in trying to save money, they were sacrificing the one thing which is their business to do: to safeguard lives!” she said.
At the ‘Light for Lives’ Rally on Saturday, committee member Austin Stack said: “the UK are already disbanding their policy of A&E centralization and reverting to localized services. They have learned this the hard way!”
Research
“We ask that Minister Harris actively ensures that no further re-configuration plans are made until they have conducted robust, reliable, credible and independent research on the outcomes and that this is done with the key stakeholders.
“He must hit reset and do this properly. Lives depend on it!” Mr Stack said.
You can watch all of the speeches from Saturday’s rally below.
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