‘Paying for parties with lives of elderly’
How outbreak in Covid-free nursing home caused havoc
AS Covid-19 rampaged its way through hospitals and nursing homes last year, staff and management at the Annabeg nursing home in Dublin managed to buck the trend and keep the virus at bay.
Their vigilance paid off with neither a carer nor a single resident contracting the infection. That success meant Annabeg, in Ballybrack, was listed as one of the last care homes in the country where residents and staff were to be inoculated.
But that all changed over Christmas, and this weekend the owner of the south Dublin nursing home revealed how in a matter of days the virus wreaked havoc.
Four of the privately run home’s 40 residents died with the virus between last weekend and Tuesday. Meanwhile, 25 others tested positive as well as two-thirds of the home’s 54 staff.
The owners of the home issued an SOS for help from the HSE.
However, it was the intervention of public representatives which finally ensured the home was allocated additional staff.
Owner William O’Connell said: ‘In the initial rollout of the vaccine that was announced in December we were to get the vaccine on the
29th of January.
‘We would have been about the last nursing home in the country to get the vaccine.
‘But if we’d had the vaccine here in December at least four people’s lives might have been saved. We got the vaccine today [Saturday]. About 30 people between staff and residents got it and it is a relief for their families.’
However, two weeks ago life at the south Dublin home changed dramatically and in 24 hours there were not enough staff to look after residents.
Mr O’Connell explained: ‘It was a case of on a Wednesday we had a strong roster and then on the Thursday our roster was decimated. We have 54 staff, they don’t all work full-time, but two-thirds of the staff tested positive for Covid. It was a catastrophe.
‘Once Covid got in it was impossible to isolate it and we did struggle to get the attention of the HSE initially. They too are in a bind. Public representatives became involved but once the HSE were mobilised they were helpful.
‘Four residents died between last weekend and Tuesday, 20 residents have recovered and there are four or five ill.’ He added: ‘We are now paying the cost of Christmas and we are paying for the Christmas parties with the lives of elderly people, that’s the reality of it.’
Meanwhile, in north Dublin a similar tale has also unfolded in a home run by the HSE.
Up to 50 people live at the Lusk Community Unit and 13 of them have died since last weekend. All but two of these deaths are confirmed Covid cases.
Meanwhile, several staff have tested positive and ten residents are now so seriously ill they are receiving palliative care.
In a statement issued last night the HSE said: ‘The first round of the Covid-19 Vaccination Programme has completed within Lusk Community Nursing Unit and all residents and staff who consented and were deemed medically fit were vaccinated on the day.’
In relation to the Annabeg nursing home, last night a spokeswoman for the HSE said a Covid-19 response Team were in regular contact with the home. ‘We have provided considerable support through a continuum of serial testing, Infection Prevention and Control advice and training opportunities and supplies of PPE,’ she said.
Two-thirds of staff and most residents got it