HSE inquiry into scandals at the Beacon gets under way
THE HSE has started the audit process in its investigation into the vaccine scandals at the Beacon Hospital exposed by the Irish Daily Mail, it has been confirmed.
It comes as HSE chief executive Paul Reid also confirmed yesterday that, prior to the scandals, Beacon Hospital management had contacted the Dublin Midlands Hospital Group to offer to run a vaccination centre for free at the private hospital.
‘My understanding is that they came forward and offered it to us,’ Mr Reid said.
Health Minister Stephen Donnelly suspended the vaccination programme at the hospital last month following a series of exposés by this newspaper.
The Mail revealed a litany of vaccine queue-jumping cases at the private hospital in south Dublin.
The Beacon was supposed to be vaccinating only frontline healthcare workers on behalf of the HSE. Around 9,000 vaccinations of frontline healthcare workers had taken place at the hospital before the programme was suspended.
The board of the Beacon has appointed Eugene McCague, former managing partner and chairman of legal firm Arthur Cox, to conduct an ‘independent review on behalf of the nonexecutive directors’ into the jab scandals exposed by the Mail.
The HSE is conducting a separate investigation into the matter, which is being conducted by Cornelia Stuart, former assistant national director of the HSE.
Ms Stuart, who now works as an independent consultant, is expected to complete her investigation in the coming weeks.
Speaking at the weekly HSE briefing yesterday, Mr Reid said: ‘We’ve commenced the audit process and it will look at the controls, processes, procedures, it will look at the totality of what has been administered; certainly it won’t get into every single vaccine that was administered, but they will look through the process, procedures and the totality of vaccinations.’
Last month, the Mail revealed that the CEO of the Beacon, Michael Cullen, personally called a private school, St Gerard’s in Bray, Co. Wicklow, to arrange vaccinations for 20 teachers.
The board of the Beacon Hospital previously issued an ‘unreserved apology’ in the wake of the Mail exposé for the ‘upset caused’.
Hours after the apology was issued, this newspaper revealed that the CEO of VHI Healthcare, John O’Dwyer, had been vaccinated at the Beacon.
Mr O’Dwyer has since stepped aside from his position pending an internal investigation.
‘Unreserved apology’