Boss of hospital in vaccine storm made €182,000 tax settlement
THE boss of one of the hospitals at the centre of the storm concerning leftover Covid vaccine doses being given to relatives of staff is a listed tax defaulter.
Professor Fergal Malone – the master at Dublin’s Rotunda maternity hospital – made a €182,000 settlement with the
Revenue Commissioners after underpaying taxes. It came on top of a second settlement of €438,000 paid by a company of which both he and wife Marie were listed as directors.
These settlements were made in 2015 just before Prof. Malone was appointed to the top job at the country’s largest maternity hospital and the 52-year-old has since lodged a legal case against an accountancy firm over the debacle.
This week, it emerged that the Rotunda was one of two maternity hospitals where leftover doses of the Pfizer Covid vaccine were given to relatives of staff. The Dublin hospital made the admission three days after questions were first raised by the Irish Mail on Sunday.
Detailed questions were submitted by the paper to the RCSI hospital group on Friday, January 15, about relatives of staff in the Rotunda, which is run by the RCSI, getting the vaccine. The hospital failed to address the queries.
However, on Monday the hospital admitted to other media that relatives of staff had been given the vaccine. A spokesman for Prof. Malone yesterday said the senior medic would not be vaccinated until all his staff had received the jab.
Dublin’s Coombe maternity hospital also got caught up in the scandal after it emerged that 16 relatives of staff were among those given the vaccine.
They included two children of the hospital’s most senior medic, Professor Michael O’Connell, who is the master of the hospital.
It was his decision that relatives receive some of the leftover doses of the vaccine.
The hospital board has ordered an independent review and Health Minister Stephen Donnelly has also asked for a report.
‘Relatives of staff got Covid jabs’