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THE HSE HAS thanked GPs “for their forbearance” as the executive admitted there have been some issues in some surgeries getting supplies of Covid-19 vaccine.
At a briefing this afternoon, HSE chief executive Paul Reid said that 54,691 vaccines were administered last week to over 85s in GP settings, beyond what he said was a target of 49,000.
Despite this he said that the delivery model for GPs “is not a simple one” and that some vaccine deliveries that were planned for this week were not met.
“We’ve definitely had some issues this week across a number of practices between cold chain deliveries and some we will re-schedule for next week. But the vast, vast majority of the over 85s will be done by the end of the week,” he said.
Reid said there were difficulties in accessing some 65 practices that cater for between 750-800 patients in the over 85 age group.
He said that the HSE had to put in place “an enhanced support structure” as part of its plans this week.
“I want to thank the GPs for forbearance when working with us. I know it’s been frustrating for them, and it was frustrating for their patients in particular, with some of the issues this week. But we’re adopting our support arrangements, a call centre is in place and we’re putting extra resources,” Reid said.
Asked about the call centres, Reid said “it’s not a large number” working in the centres and numbers up to 10 people handling calls.
Rural areas
The HSE has a number of different vaccine delivery models in place for different GP practices depending on their size, with smaller practices encouraged to “buddy up” with others.
Asked today why some practices have not done this, HSE Chief Clinical Officer Dr Colm Henry said it may be due to their location.
“Why individual practices can’t buddy up, there may be individual reasons, the remoteness, the rural nature, the small number I don’t know,” he said.
It’s up to us, working with them, for whatever reasons they have to make that one common aim we all share which is to get this vaccine out to people no matter how small the number of people in a practice.
Syringes
Concerns have also been raised about equipment for GPs, with one GP from Galway telling the Today with Claire Byrne programme on RTÉ Radio that he drove around Connemara last Saturday evening in order to gather syringes because they were not delivered with vials of the Pfizer vaccine.
Asked if this was an widespread issue, Reid said:
On the consumables as we would call it, we’ve investigated any cases where we’ve been advised of where consumables weren’t there either in advance or in a timely fashion for the administration of the vaccine. Certainly the ones I’ve been alerted to have been investigated.
“The ones we’ve been alerted to and identified to date, we have been able to track that consumers were delivered, but if they haven’t please let us know.”
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Not fit for purpose ever
@Paul Dolan: joke why would people in the north want a United ireland when they have the NHS and we have the HSE.
@Paul Dolan: another know it all..
@Joe Johnson: that’s a good point actually…
@Ger Murphy: read the news you dipstick. Cervical check, countless court cases due to neglecting patients, sending the elderly to their deaths….yes I do think I know what they have done and I and going by today, thousands more dont have faith in the HSE rolling out this vaccine program
@Paul Dolan: you’re not fit for purpose? The GPS?……????
@Joe Johnson: the NHS gets more critisism in the UK than the HSE here.
Longest waiting lists in Europe, now over 1 million (a waiting list means care is denied), the most expensive and delayed children’s hospital in the world (still waiting, still spending) people dead from negligence (cervical cancer), exhausted health staff that will exodus when the pandemic ends (they have been incredible but there is only so much a person can give.) Little prospect of recruiting what we need. And now this. A mess of the biggest challenge that has ever faced the country. At what point do people take to the streets, the internet and demand extensive reform of the HSE? The « clipboards » and pen pushers have had their chance and when push came to shove (again) they failed us (again.) Time for deep reform of the HSE. Its actually a matter of life and death at this point.
@Patrick McConville: Nothing will happen. It’s all fully accepted by the Irish people. Incompetence is rewarded in this country.
@David Corrigan: As long as we all keep voting for FFG nothing will change. The alternatives might be unpalatable but it’s better then the status quo. We need to wake up as a nation and demand better. FFG need at least a decade in opposition to learn a little humility and and stop taking the electorate for granted.
@Patrick McConville: all very nice words but what specifically would you do, if you what change would give you the biggest bang for your buck?
Paul Reid doesn’t have a clue what he is doing. €300,000 a year salary is a joke.
@Just Some Guy: We have a CEO of the HSE, Minister of Health, and Secretary General at the Department of Health, so between 3 people running close to 1 million, and all as useless as the next. (robo happiness, lovely, excellent, great, brilliant!)
@Just Some Guy: what would you do differently, if you would you change your accent.
Translated as “I am completely out of my depth and don’t know what I’m doing”
@millsd: isn’t his background from telecommunications at Eir/Eircom and they weren’t run efficiently either
@Eoin O’Neill: in what sense were they run inefficiently?
If Paul Reid had a euro for every vaccination handed out to date, well, It might just about cover his overinflated HSE salary.
Maybe.
@Alan Bury: if he got a Euro for every vaccine handed out we wouldn’t be behind, he’d make sure half the population was vaccinated by now.
Chief waffler Stephen Donnelly and new entrant to the waffle league Paul Reid, what a pair of t/t$ both totally out of their depth, need to go
We all called that they make a pig”s ear of it and sure enough they did not disappoint. But people will die because of their failure.
@Sean: you wouldn’t ask a logistics expert to take out your appendix but they are happy to put doctors in charge of logistics. The only medical bit of this is at the very end. Outsource the logistics to Musgrave’s or Amazon or Uniphar… People who get product to the right place at the right time..
@Derdaly: no doctors in charge of logistics, just usual HSE middle management
@Derdaly: definitely not doctors involved with the logistics of the HSE. Those responsible are the unaccountable penpushers in the HSE that make up a large portion of our embarrassingly dysfunctional health system in this country
What is there to say here other than what most bar the deluded have been saying for quite a while now ..
Be interesting to see how the usual suspects spin this as a success here and how far up the EU rankings for this or that depending on which way the wind is blowing ..
The saddest part about all this is it’s no surprise.
10 covid related stories in just under 12 hrs … that’s good going …be hard to keep that pace up.
Absolutely shocking. Three ring Circus. Excuse after excuse!
It’s the “who you know and not what you know “ approach that is dragging our institutions into the dire state that they are in.
@Jules: explain that
Has Paul Reid not been sacked yet, what are they waiting for, maybe another disaster.
approx 200 died from reaction to pfizer and 200 died from reaction to astrozeneca in the uk last month, worth considering
@Mags Murphy: if you read the data they say, and I’m paraphrasing in layman’s terms, that with elderly people the chances are that some of these would have died anyway because they were elderly. It’s funny they dont use that argument when they talk about a covid death in the elderly. If an elderly person has a positive test within 28 days of a death they died from covid, but if they die within a few days of getting the vaccine it’s just coincidental and because they were going to die anyway. What a double standard. Laughable if it wasnt so serious….spindoctors!
@Mags Murphy: hahahahaha
@Mags Murphy: the reports you link say that investigations of the individual deaths does NOT link them with getting the vaccine.
Why do our government have to be so slow. I feel like we are the only country so behind with the vaccines.
Since when did the hse know what they are doing . Complete knobheads.
Pr1ck
I love the pun in the headline.
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