St Mary's nursing home disclosure
Deputy O'Dowd raised a protected disclosure and sought the full publication of the St. Mary's investigation. The Taoiseach said the HSE has published a summary, will check why the full report is not public, and acknowledged the discloser’s role.
I welcome the commitment the Taoiseach has reiterated this morning. The fact is that 24 residents died in St. Mary's community nursing unit in the first phase of the pandemic in 2020. A protected disclosure was made and was discussed by the HSE at a meeting held on 14 May 2020. The minutes of that meeting show that advice was given to take emails relating to that review and investigation off the system. The investigation team requested the permission of the HSE to investigate the letter I sent it on this matter. The HSE refused to give that permission. It is extremely important that the people who wrote this particular letter in regard to St. Mary's are interviewed and the letter discussed as part of the Taoiseach's inquiry. Only an executive summary of the report has been published. That is only 17 pages of a 500-page report. All of that report needs to be published. It was delayed for more than 12 months for reasons I am unable to fathom.
Comment on this
Last week, the HSE published a summary report on the investigation into the protected disclosure made into the handling of Covid-19 in St. Mary's Hospital community nursing unit. During the period in question, 83 of the 146 residents were confirmed to have tested positive for Covid and, sadly, 22 died as a result. I do not know why the report has not been published in full. There may be a good reason for that. I will check and come back to the Deputy on that. It is important to recognise the role played by the discloser in raising these issues as well as the context of the time and the unprecedented challenge faced by health and social care teams, including the staff at St. Mary's Hospital. The investigation has upheld five of the 12 areas of concern raised by the whistleblower but has not upheld the other seven. It is important to bear that in mind. People will make disclosures, raise issues and make allegations. Sometimes all of these are upheld and sometimes they are not. Sometimes some are while others are not. That is why it is important that we carry out proper examinations and investigations.