Deputy McCarthy apologised for his non-attendance. He was invited as were other Members of the Oireachtas but they apologised for their non-attendance. The crowd were incensed at the thought that their hospital would be swept away without due consideration and they will attend in force at tommorrow's meeting to overturn the decision. On Friday night the Tipperary Urban District Council met in emergency session and took a unanimous decision that this hospital should not be closed. A telegram was sent to both the Minister for Health and to the CEO conveying the feeling of that emergency meeting. On Sunday there was a meeting of the staff of St. Vincent's and local doctors. It was a pitiful meetings, because those dedicated staff, who had given loving care to the people of Tipperary town and its hinterland were totally disillusioned that their jobs could be swept away at the whim of the CEO of the South Eastern Health Board. Their futures were being swept away. They beseeched the public representatives and Members of the Oireachtas to bring this to the attention of the Minister and Dáil Éireann.
There is a strong case for the retention of St. Vincent's Hospital on either social, economic or medical grounds. The hospital is 24 miles from the nearest acute medical centre in either Clonmel or in Limerick. Limerick city, as we all know is in the mid Western Health Board area, and the South Eastern Health Board dissuade their doctors from sending patients outside of their own region due to the increased costs. Last year they paid £14 million to other health boards for the services given outside of their area. St. Vincent's Hospital contains 42 semi-acute beds with a greater than 84 per cent bed occupancy in 1986, the average stay being 15.3 days or approximately half the national average for a hospital of its kind. According to Department of Health statistics produced in 1985 the average cost per week per occupied bed in St. Vincent's Hospital is £232 compared with £410 in St. Joseph's Hospital in Clonmel.
The members of the South Eastern Health Board and indeed the Minister should be aware that £10,000 was collected in a brief six weeks shortly before Christmas last to raise funds for the equipping of the physiotherapy unit at St. Vincent's Hospital. This unit is now fully operational, with a saving to the South Eastern Health Board of large sums of money on three counts. First, there is a saving on transport to and from Cashel and Clonmel for physiotherapy. Secondly, there is a reduction in the use by doctors of non-steroidal anti-inflammatory drugs and/or cortisone which constitutes a large saving. Thirdly, there is a reduction in the overload of patients requiring physiotherapy at Cashel and Clonmel.
On a ward round this week, on 3 May, the doctors medically assessed patients present in St. Vincent's Hospital, when there was a full complement of 42 patients. Of those, two-thirds require acute treatment, were not fit for discharge and would require to be transferred either to St. Joseph's Hospital in Clonmel—which is also to lose a number of beds—or to the Regional Hospital in Limerick, which would cost additional moneys and be outside the South Eastern Health Board area. One might well ask what about the remaining one-third? They would have to receive home care or home help necessitating many visits by local doctors which would amount to quite a sizeable sum.
The closure of St. Vincent's Hospital in Tipperary town cannot be justified on medical or economic grounds. We must insist that, before the South Eastern Health Board take this decision — which is totally premature — they examine every other possibility. They should examine every single possibility before embarking on the irreparable step of closing either St. Vincent's Hospital or reducing Our Lady's hospital in Cashel by 20 beds, with six posts going at a saving of £90,000, or reducing St. Joseph's Medical Hospital, Clonmel by ten beds, with 3 posts being lost, at a meagre saving of £50,000 or indeed reducing St. Joseph's Psychiatric Hospital by 87 beds, the saving in respect of which I am not aware.
We recall with pride that about a year and a half ago the then Minister for Health, now present in the House, opened a magnificent extension to St. Luke's Hospital in Clonmel at a cost of £1.5 million. Barely 18 months later, 87 of those beds are to be closed down. Where are we going as regards psychiatric care or medical attention in South Tipperary? Indeed on that occasion the Minister was practically assassinated by groups of anguished people from other hospital areas coming to protest——
