HSE Chief Executive, Cathal Magee, has confirmed to the Dáil’s Public Accounts Committee today, that the Accident and Emergency Department at Mallow General Hospital will be downgraded to an urgent care centre and MAU from November 2011.
Speaking in the wake of the decision Sinn Féin TD for Cork East Sandra McLellan said:
“Our worst fears have been confirmed today by the Chief Executive of the HSE. Services at the Accident and Emergency Department at Mallow will be drastically curtailed as and from November of this year. The ‘Roscommon model’ of an urgent care centre and Medical Assessment Unit will mean a huge reduction in services. This is a move which has been signed, sealed and delivered by the new Government. Last night we in Sinn Féin provided Government TDs with the opportunity to avoid this outcome. They chose not to.
“I have no doubt that this move will cost lives. That has been the experience in Monaghan and in the Mid West, for example, when similar steps were taken. We are now expecting patients from the greater east Cork area who need urgent medical attention to bypass Mallow and go to CUH, the hospital which only this week was identified as the most overcrowded in the country. And Minister Reilly and our local Government TDs tell us that this is in the interest of safety! That argue simply doesn’t stand up.”