They wouldn’t be long going back into the office
Think there’s a simple answer to that.
He’s Sinn Feins Health Spokesperson.
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Just shut them down for a month. No ifs no buts.
With no notice too. Obviously
Get your stash in.
Nphet allowed get too big for its boots
Body dominated Covid-19 discussion almost to exclusion of anyone else
Michael McDowell
It was inevitable, in some respects, that the relationship between Nphet and the Government would reach a point of crisis. It was inexcusable for the Government and the nation to learn on the Sunday evening 9pm news that the move to Level 5 was being mooted for the following day.
It was, no matter how you call it, a political hand-grenade thrown into the Cabinet room. Nphet must have understood its effect. Was what done was a deliberate stratagem to impose its will on the Government and through it on the people. The inevitable aspect of this impasse arises from the prior willingness of successive taoiseachs and ministers for health to insist that they were simply “following the science” in accepting Nphet recommendations. To that extent, politicians sowed the seeds and very nearly reaped the whirlwind.
The pandemic has massive implications for the State’s well-being – economic, social and public health. The State’s response to the pandemic could never and should never, have “followed the science” of epidemiology or the advice of epidemiologists alone.
Looking back, it is hard to remember any countervailing voice to that of Nphet being accorded the same weight or publicity in relation to the devastating effects of lockdown for cancer screening, prevention and treatment, for psychiatric illness and for social services to the disabled (mental and physical) and the families of the disabled.
Public health
It was as if public health had been reduced to protection from Covid-19 alone. Psychiatric care, suicide prevention, and measures to deal with depression were effectively sidelined because they did not feature as aspects of the public health emergency within the remit of Nphet. Moreover, Nphet was permitted to dominate public perceptions of the pandemic almost to the exclusion of anyone else. The broadcast media, in particular, became an extension of Nphet policy. Opinion polls financed, in effect, by our health system reinforced Nphet’s view about public perceptions.
In view of the virtual monopoly of policy ideas and analysis which the broadcast media conferred on Nphet, it should come as no surprise that they were able to report to the Government that their advice enjoyed widespread public support. Those who queried any aspect of their advice ended up being challenged in the media (including the social media) as valuing wealth over life. Doubt was equated with subversion of social solidarity. The information made available to the public and the emphasis put on certain statistics were carefully choreographed to support the Nphet point of view.
A patient admitted to hospital with a massive heart attack or stroke who happened to die while Covid-positive was counted as a Covid-19 death, as one public health practitioner had to admit to the final meeting of the Dáil’s Covid-19 committee. Maps showing Covid-19 infections by electoral districts were left unrevised so that clusters appeared in places where the problem had greatly abated.
While emphasis was put on Covid-19’s real danger to people of all ages, data such as the median age of persons recorded as dying with Covid-19 was reluctantly described as “in the high 80s” (actually 88, I believe) in Nphet evidence to the same final meeting of the Dáil Covid-19 committee.
A huge mistake
In retrospect (and I accept that retrospect is always 20-20 vision), it was a huge mistake to convert Nphet from a purely advisory body into a self-regulating advocacy group. At last, the many and not just the few, are asking the question as to whether the State’s hospital and ICU facilities were expanded since they were the justification for total lockdown in March of this year. Who did what in the meantime?
Did Nphet speak about the urgent necessity to boost this capacity at its press conferences? Were they asked about it by those attending?
Did they, as the HSE certainly did, flannel and bluff their way around the stark truth that little or nothing has been accomplished on that front in the last half year?
Who is responsible for what appears to be a very mediocre test-and-trace system? Does the Department of Health have any responsibility in these matters? What was the reasoning behind the Government’s effort to interpose a filtering committee between the Cabinet and Nphet? Was last Sunday’s coup an effort to avoid such scrutiny?
The policy monopoly conferred on Nphet and the HSE was hardwired to fail us on non-Covid-19 public health matters and on supervising an adequate response in our health infrastructure. We need joined-up thinking, decision-making and implementation in our struggle to live with Covid-19. The economy is not a mere residual in public policy. There are huge costs too for lockdown in terms of lives lost, lives ruined, occupations destroyed, social and cultural activity, recreation, loneliness, depression, domestic abuse and psychiatric well-being.
All these must be at the centre of our political discourse. Political responsibility and accountability must always lie in our democratically elected institutions.
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There is a GIGANTIC tailback southbound on the N7 around the Kildare/Dublin border. Checkpoint.
5km or so
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Looking at Google maps, ones in Leixlip and on the way into Tallaght too on county borders.
Looks busy around Bray!
Rounds are empty around Cark…
As of 6:30pm yesterday,
There were 27 vacant ICU beds in the country. Was 33 the day before.
24 confirmed covid cases in ICU. 11 of these are on ventilators
10 suspected covid cases in ICU. 5 of these are on ventilators.
Zero covid deaths in ICU in the previous 24 hours.
This figure is bollox is it not?
This just new admissions to ICU that are waiting on the result of the obligatory covid test?
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A system of graduated fines which could include €50 penalties for not wearing masks and €200 penalties for leaving your county should be considered, Tánaiste Leo Varadkar told his party last night.
Sources present at the Fine Gael parliamentary party meeting said Mr Varadkar told TDs and Senators that the previous system of €2500 fines for those who break Covid-19 regulations was seen as draconian.
A better system of graduated fines should be considered, he said, including €50 fines for those who do not wear masks or €200 fines for those who breach travel restrictions.
It is understood that Mr Varadkar spoke out against allowing gardaí or public officials to enter people’s homes and said a warrant would be needed to do this.
Meanwhile the chief medical officer Tony Holohan met with one of the country’s top civil servants yesterday to discuss the ongoing fall-out between Government and the National Public Health Emergency Team.
Sources said that Mr Holohan met with the secretary general of the Department of Taoiseach Martin Fraser on Tuesday afternoon.
Multiple Government spokespeople said on Tuesday that they did not know who Mr Holohan was meeting at Government buildings.
But sources confirmed early on Wednesday morning that the meeting took place as all parties seek to smooth over the recent controversy over calls to move the country immediately into Level 5 restrictions.
Yeah suspected covid cases awaiting test results.
I dont think are even suspected covid cases?
If you are in an accident and taken straight to ICU you’ll be counted as a suspected case until your test comes back negative
Blueshirts love people complying to their rules and taken money from the poor
That’s outrageous. There is no legal basis to set up those checkpoints. People going to work/school/making deliveries/going to shops are entitled to go about their lawful business without being boxed in by the Gardai.
They have to be seen this morning as its supposed to piss rain later in the day.
Cant have them out in the rain like.
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This is scandalous.
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