Leo surprises his critics with festive hospital visit
‘Know you’re hard at work’
LEO Varadkar surprised his critics in the health service yesterday by paying a visit to Cork University Hospital on Christmas Day.
Doctors, nurses and paramedics have been posting pictures of themselves hard at work in response to the Taoiseach’s suggestion last month that staff taking time off during the festive season was to blame for the overcrowding.
Using the hashtags #ImAtWorkLeo and #WeAreWorking on social media, health service staff have been giving personal accounts of long, busy working days away from their families.
But in an unexpected twist yesterday, staff from a number CUH posted of health pictures service on Twitter of themselves with the Taoiseach after he paid a visit.
The Taoiseach is spending Christmas in Cork with his partner Dr Matt Barrett and his family. Nurse Ciara O’Flynn posted a selfie with the Taoiseach, with the caption: ‘#WeAreWorking and look who came to visit on Puffin ward #cuh’. Emergency Department trainee, Michael Sheehan also posted a selfie with the Taoiseach. ‘Thanks for the visit Taoiseach! #WeAreWorking @campaignforleo @adrmurphy @CUH_Cork,’ he wrote.
The Taoiseach responded to both by acknowledging their hard work. ‘Know you’re hard at work. Thanks for welcome when I visited @CUH_Cork today. Will do my best to make improvements to our health service in 2019.’
Mr Varadkar provoked anger in November when he suggested that the use of a skeleton staff in some hospital departments was to blame for the overcrowding in emergency departments in early January every year. Speaking in the Dáil in November, he said: ‘What has been happening in our health service for ten or 15 years is that hospitals effectively closed down for seven days out of 12. We need to change that.’
A spokesman for the Taoiseach told the Irish Daily Mail yesterday that Mr Varadkar is fully aware of all the hard work that goes on over the Christmas period. He said: ‘At no stage did he suggest anyone should not take their annual leave or time off work. The health service encounters the same problems every year at the start of January.
‘The onus is therefore on those in charge of rostering to ensure the health service is capable of operating diagnostics and tests when they are required, so that people can be treated.’