Taoiseach Micheál Martin has warned his own TDs and Senators to brace themselves for a “shocking” winter in the health service because of a backlog of cancer cases after Covid.
The reason Mr Martin issued the grim warning was because the health service is seeing an increasing delay in cancer care that the health service is battling to catch up on.
The Fianna Fáil leader gave the warning at a private meeting of Fianna Fáil parliamentary party members.
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One party backbencher who was at the meeting and heard Mr Martin, told the Irish Mirror: “It was a scary analysis.
The TD added: “But you….. I don’t think anyone was that shocked, everything was put on hold for Covid and now we’re seeing the inevitable backlog.”
Covid saw huge deferment of many cases of cancer care and the health service is now seeing them being presented for treatment.
The Irish Examiner reported another Fianna Fáil member at the meeting as saying: “What they told us was sobering.
“All over Europe, this is being seen, and it is going to hit us in the next year.
“Delayed diagnoses, too late for medicine, it was quite frightening.”
Aontú leader and Meath TD, Peader Tóibín, received information on the drastic backlogs through a PQ (Parliamentary Question) from the Minister for Health, Stephen Donnelly.
It showed that from January to August this year, GP cancer e-referrals to Rapid Access Clinics are at 136.5% of 2019 activity, while in August, this figure ballooned to 152.8%.
Mr Donnelly said the number of cancers diagnosed in Rapid Access Clinics from January to July this year was 3,431 — 95.6% of the figure in 2019 for the same period.
Mr Tóibín blasted the “appalling” situation.
He said: "If we are to use the number of referrals to rapid access clinics for breast and prostate cancer as our metric for gathering this data then we see cause to worry — so far this year we see a 36.5% increase in referrals when compared with the same period in 2019.
"If we take last month as a standalone figure we see a 53% increase in referrals.
“Aontú would call on the Government to facilitate a Dáil debate on these figures as soon as possible, so we can see what extra supports or funding need to go into the cancer screening, diagnosis, and treatment services in the State
“It's really appalling that our cancer screening services in this country were closed for such a length of time during the pandemic.
“Cancer services must always be recognised as essential services.”
One in three of all deaths in Ireland every year are from cancer.
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