Dáil Éireann Debate, Friday - 3 December 2021
99. Deputy Gino Kenny asked the Minister for Health the number of ICU beds currently being sourced from private hospitals; and the monthly cost to the Exchequer of these beds; and if he will make a statement on the matter. [59505/21]
View answerAt the end of January 2021 all 18 Private Hospitals signed a Safety Net 2 agreement to provide additional hospital capacity to the HSE to deal with the surge in Covid-19. The agreement remains in place to help deal with any further surge in the pandemic that occurs this year.
Under the agreement the HSE can obtain up to 15% or 30% of the private hospitals’ capacity, dependent on certain metrics occurring. The HSE triggered the agreement between the end of January and the end of May this year.
The HSE also made use of Private Hospital capacity, through a Safety Net 3 arrangement, to help it deal with the cyber attack in May this year.
It is estimated that there are 47 ICU beds and 54 High Dependency Unit beds in the Private Hospital System. Therefore, the number available to the public sector with access to 15% of private hospital capacity would be 7 and 14 at 30%.
In recent weeks, the HSE continues to access up to 1,300 bed days, an average of 10 ICU beds, delivering care to around 450 patients a week. Since the start of 2021 over 65,000 bed days have been used with over 20,500 patients treated.
Based on the latest information from the HSE the total payments to date in 2021 in relation to SN2 and 3 are €90.31 million.
