COVID-19 AND FLU DISASTER WARNING
AN EMERGENCY medicine expert has warned of “Armageddon” this winter with a failing health service like “hell on earth” thanks to a double onslaught of Covid-19 and the flu.
Dr Fergal Hickey, who is president of the
Irish Association of Emergency Medicine and a consultant in emergency medicine at Sligo University Hospital, warned that his doomsday scenario will unfold if the HSE does not overcome hospital waiting times.
He spoke out because of the “potential of the twin tsunamis that are facing us”.
Dr Hickey issued his warning as health experts in the Emergency Department Task Force met yesterday to discuss a winter plan to offset a so-called ‘twindemic’ scenario that a report estimated could put 17,000 Covid-19 patients in hospital, along with 4,500 flu patients, and 700 in ICU.
The report for the meeting also detailed how there were 40,398 breaches of waiting times when patients were left waiting over 24 hours this year.
Bed
Dr Hickey fears hospital services “could collapse” and has urged the annual winter plan to be replaced by a year-round approach because it is not enough to pay attention to bed capacity once a year in winter.
He said: “If that scenario comes to pass, that will be hell on earth for both patients and the clinical staff who are looking after them.
“It would be an Armageddon-type situation. We simply don’t have the bed capacity to cope as things stand. That has not been addressed after many years of agitation on the issue.
“Our acute bed capacity is 2.8 hospital beds per 1000 of the population.
“The OECD average is 1.3, so we are going into this [winter] with one hand tied behind our back.”