A Donegal County Councillor has called for urgent long-term investment in the health service as winter approaches.
Sinn Féin Cllr Gerry McMonagle, who is Vice-Chair of the Regional Health Forum West, claimed that the government is taking a “sticky plaster approach” to fixing problems in healthcare.
Speaking at this month’s council meeting, Cllr McMonagle called on the council to write to the Minister for Health to make more money available to help health services at this time.
Cllr McMonagle said these extraordinary times call for further investment:
“I firmly believe the money that is allocated for the winter is not adequate enough to meet the current health service needs, what we need is further capacity in our hospitals, more nurses and doctors and protection for the healthcare workers.
“We have €600 million to get us through the winter problems we have, these are not ordinary times, it takes an extraordinary initiative from our government to invest in health service to deal with not only Covid but the growing waiting lists too,” Cllr McMonagle said.