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WHEN PEOPLE ARE reported missing, there are a number of possible outcomes: many people are found safe and well within hours or days.
Others – sometimes by choice, sometimes in mysterious and suspicious circumstances – are never seen again.
Yesterday, we brought you the stories of the volunteer search and rescue crews who help families achieve some measure of closure by searching for bodies in the days and weeks after a loved one goes missing.
As part of our ‘Missing’ series, we’ve been speaking to the specialist garda members and investigators who work as part of the sub-aqua team who search – often in incredibly tough conditions – for clues on the fate of those presumed murdered.
A 14-year-old girl went missing from a care home in 2006. It was a case that got little media coverage until her body was found 18 months later.
Melissa Mahon had been murdered, put into a sleeping bag wearing a Disney nightdress and thrown into a river.
It was an incredibly distressing case. It’s one that remains with Sergeant Eamonn Bracken – a 15 year veteran of the sub-aqua unit – to this day.
The thing I always remembered is that nobody seemed to notice this 14-year-old was gone, it didn’t seem to get into headlines at all.
Mahon was in the care of the HSE when she disappeared. The teenager had gone missing from a care house on 13 September 2006, and was then placed in a foster home.
However, she ran away from the foster family on the same day and a social worker stayed with her at a garda station that night. Mahon also ran away from the social worker, on the morning of 14 September.
It’s believed she was strangled to death on some date between 14 and 30 September – but it wasn’t until 18 months had passed that her remains surfaced in Lough Gill in Sligo.
“When we searched the lake we discovered the first parts of the remains of that little girl,” Bracken recalled.
“She had been put into a sleeping bag and thrown into the river.
It was in January 2008 and the weather was horrific, but it was all worth it in the end, when everything is put together and we can get a conviction.
Ronnie Dunbar received a 15-year sentence for Melissa’s murder.
At the trial, all of the items that were found in the search were shown to the court by a member of the garda underwater unit. They included Melissa’s remains, a sleeping bag, a tie (which was used to tie the sleeping bag) and a faded cream nightdress with a Beauty and the Beast illustration on it.
The trial heard that Dunbar strangled the young girl before putting her body in the sleeping bag and weighing it down with stones. Bracken said:
There’s a huge sense of work satisfaction … When we get to the site and you see a distraught family – there is satisfaction, because it’s a job well done.
Bracken was also with the garda sub-aqua unit during its involvement in one of the most high-profile (and most gruesome) murder cases this country has seen.
I suppose the one I’ll always remember would be the search of Farah Swaleh Noor in the case widely referred to as that of the Scissor Sisters.
Noor – a Kenyan immigrant – was murdered by his girlfriend’s daughters Charlotte and Linda Mulhall.
The killing took place at a flat Kathleen Mulhall was renting in Summerhill, on the northside of Dublin city, on 20 March 2005. Noor was stabbed up to 20 times and his body was cut into pieces, before being dumped in the canal.
The sisters infamously brought his head on a Dublin Bus, and hid it in a park in Tallaght before it was moved again to another location.
We did a lot of work on that case, we went to where the initial body parts were found in the Royal Canal.
A torso was found in the canal in March 2005, ten days after Noor had been murdered.
Bracken also said, ”We later recovered a knife and hammer in Tymon Park in Tallaght, which was used in the murder.”
Charlotte Mulhall was given a mandatory life sentence. Linda Mulhall was given a 15-year sentence for manslaughter – and the pair remain behind bars today.
The garda sub-aqua unit played a pivotal role in the investigation into Elaine O’Hara’s death, gathering evidence from the bed of a reservoir in Co Wicklow across days of searches.
The Killiney woman’s body was found in the Dublin Mountains in September 2013, a year after she went missing.
At the same time, nearly 20 miles away, Garda James O’Donoghue was re-searching Vartry Reservoir after bondage equipment had been found there three days earlier.
Most of Elaine’s clothes, her keys and her glasses were found in the reservoir. The barcode on a Dunnes Stores loyalty card identified that the 36-year-old was the owner of the tag.
Sub-aqua team
At that stage the scene was closed off and the garda sub-aqua unit called in. They subsequently found two mobile phones – a discovery that played a key role in the conviction of Graham Dwyer.
A garda source talked TheJournal.ie through the procedure in such cases:
“If there’s anything found belonging to a missing person, then it’s a crime scene.
“It’s described as a crime scene from that point and you’ve got all the forensics that go with that to see if there’s any hint of the person on the items.
You have to take all the precautions and as you come across anything the area has to be isolated.
“Items found are stored in each division’s PEMS [Property Exhibits Management System, a secure facility for evidence] stores.
If it’s a gun it goes to the technical bureau for testing. Items are kept unless the State applies to destroy them.
When a body is found, “obviously it becomes a very sterile crime scene”.
“A preliminary examination is carried out on scene before the body is taken away for a post-mortem.
The state pathologist will nearly always visit the scene while the body is in situ, they have to know the position of the body when they do the post-mortem.
Black water
Retired garda sergeant Thomas ‘Tosh’ Lavery spent 30 years in the unit and says “diving for bodies is like nothing else in the world.
It’s done almost always in nil visibility, feeling your way around.
Nil visibility is a term used to describe black water, where you can’t see anything at all – like when the base of a river or lake is stirred up after a heavy fall of rain, or at the mouth of a river when saltwater meets freshwater.
The work of the sub-aqua unit is difficult – physically and mentally – but it can be key to a murder investigation, even years after a person has gone missing.
In spite of the stress, the often freezing conditions and the long hours – Sergeant Bracken stresses:
There is a huge sense of job satisfaction when you see what you’ve done and the part you’ve played in it when people are eventually convicted.
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Give the house parties a miss till the bank holiday weekend in October. Come on people, get it together and stay apart.
@Twitruser2020:
The data doesn’t agree with Dr Glynn
Deaths continue to be low for months now and ICU admissions are on the floor. Sweden has one of lowest infection rates in Europe, no masks everything remained open, people haven’t being robbed of their way of life and their livelihoods.
@Twitruser2020: might all well party now. Halloween will be canceled by these psychopaths
@Seamus Hughes: but thousands of people have been robbed of their lives.
@Damian Mac An Bháird: Wait till devil’s night it will be some Friday to have some fun. Plus you can party the whole week as the bank holiday is early. Hold till then!
@Seamus Hughes: how would you compare our current status versus that of the UK? Considering the UK have the highest number of deaths in Europe. Sweden have a much higher death rate than Ireland. Ireland currently stands at 366.95 deaths per million, while Sweden is 573.79 per million! So what our government is asking isn’t a huge ask, nor is it difficult to follow! https://www.statista.com/statistics/1104709/coronavirus-deaths-worldwide-per-million-inhabitants/
@Twitruser2020: i will. I’ll b a good boy for the psychopaths
@Damian Mac An Bháird: So please explain how these medical professionals are psychopaths? I know we all have fatigue in relation to this covid-19 poop but they are just trying to save the vulnerable. I wouldn’t call them psycho I would call it empathic. Its not all about you, the greater good is what is required. Even if this policy saves one life isn’t that better. Just think about it.
@Seamus Hughes: I said it on another post, tis a bit sciencey and factsy that. He didn’t leave any room for hysteria, emotion and hyperbole.
We really need to start asking questions about these very blunt statistics we’re are presented with ad nauseam with absolutely no investigation or alternative views presented or permitted. Our loved ones are dying alone and afraid in nursing homes or in hospitals, there is untold suffering for those with other serious and life threatening diseases, the economy… well wait for that.
We cant afford another 6 months of these draconian restrictions, and even if we do, what then?
@Twitruser2020: No. Because isolation kills people too. So the one Covid death will be negated multiple times by the deaths caused by the loneliness suffered. Nevermind the hundreds of thousands on waiting lists or thousands of undiagnosed cancer cases caused by this policy.
@Monster Munch: agree 100%
@Seamus Hughes: go get the facts on Sweden – death rate 578 deaths per million (5846 deaths in total) Ireland 360 deaths per million (1781 deaths in total). Ireland and Sweden had the same rates in May but our actions stopped deaths. If Ireland had Sweden’s death rates we would have an extra 218 deaths per million (over 1000 extra deaths).
Everything did not stay open as before, social distancing and table service applied in bars and cafes and they were closed if they broke those rules. Over 90% reduction in journeys and public transport use. 20% of adult Swedes opt to weak masks. Case rate low as they stopped community testing and tracing for a period.
@Seamus Hughes: Sweden?? No, I don’t think so. Three times as many deaths and cases as us and this with a much lower population density. Four people died there yesterday alone. No thanks.
@Twitruser2020: Or until your government says so. 1984
@GrumpyAulFella: On a per capita basis they have about 1100 more deaths than us. However they did not stop screening for cancer or create the biggest waiting list in their history (not including the undiagnosed cancers). If just .18 percent on our waiting list die cos their treatment got delayed, we’ve saved no lives.
@Stephen Doyle:
Disgraceful comment
@Seamus Hughes: Yet there were calls for the Doctor in question to resign, after thousands died in care homes. They are the fifth highest death rate per capita in Europe. 5 times higher than Denmark and 10 times higher than Norway and Finland.
@Niall Ó Cofaigh: Sweden did not classify covid deaths if there was any other cause, whereas our figures include probable and with covid.
Normalising our data to Sweden’s reduces the deaths per million to close to 100 for Ireland.
@Monster Munch: cancer screening is open here, certainly for cervical anyway. Haven’t checked others. Per capita, last week, Sweden’s fatality rate was double ours. Their capital city’s population is much smaller than ours. Their population density is one third of ours. They have restrictions, secondary schools closed and universities closed, gatherings limited to 50 people, unnecessary travel banned. They postponed 10s of thousands of medical procedures as their health system began to collapse. Still they have 3 times the number of deaths. No thanks.
@Seamus Hughes: twice our population, 3 times our deaths….no thanks
@GrumpyAulFella: They have 1.8m over 65s we have 600k. Direct correlation there?
@Vladimir Macro: Thought you were moving to Sweden.
@Seamus Hughes: I’ll never understand people defending Sweden when they have a sparser population with a higher death rate. And to those saying we should party like its 2019, that will just make a lockdown inevitable on Halloween! So just do as you are told, we aren’t doing this for fun.
@Twitruser2020: no. Its live versus lives. That debate isn’t even being had.
@Monster Munch: not sure but wouldn’t Denmark and Norway share those over 65 stats? I’d expect that Scandinavian countries would be about 20% yet Denmark and Norway fatality rates are nothing like Sweden’s so I think we can conclude that the Swedish model is very questionable.
@GrumpyAulFella: They do. Yet Sweden fared worse than the other Scandinavian countries
@Seamus Hughes: ssshhh!! You’re not allowed say Sweden!!!
I think the point that’s being missed about Sweden is that they accepted that their would be a certain level of death, but it wouldn’t be the 60000 that the “experts” predicted, and that they would do there best to protect the vulnerable, something nearly every country in Europe failed in.
We pretended we could save everyone, and are still trying to in some sort of saving face effort…
The scoreboards tell one story, but the reality is the swedes are coming out for the 2nd half flying fit, with the wind at their backs, playing downhill, and everyone on the opposing side know it.
@Daire Kennedy: We never pretended we could save everyone. We did what we did to prevent our already poor health care system from being overburdened, and with the numbers being reported from Italy and Spain at the time, I don’t blame them. Taking those same figures from Spain and Italy, the Swedish government had no issue taking the route they did and were quite willing to sacrifice their vunerable for their economy. They must have been expecting 10,000s of deaths when they decided o the route they took. Either that or they did not take it seriously.
@Twitruser2020: It’s not house parties you need to worry about, looking at the green near my house.
@Joe_X: looks to me like they had a balanced approach, hoping they could protect the vulnerable while keeping the country running, time will tell if they got it right…
I doubt taking the action they did, they expected 10000s of deaths, whatever figure that is.
“We did what we did to…”, Why are we still doing it? That would’ve been a very reasonable response for 2 or 4, or even 6 wks into March, but we’re still pretending we can stop this from spreading, and that it’s a deadly virus going to kill 30000 people, when there is clear evidence it is not.
We have wasted a summer when the virus is at its weakest building up a decent level of immunity, and could be going through the same come January, while the swedes will be saunaing and skinny dipping together without a care in the world!!
@Niall Ó Cofaigh: Still spreading BS about Sweden’s death rate I see. According to the CSO, 92% of all deaths are over 65 yr olds. Sweden has three times the number of over 65’s as Ireland. Compare by age group (over and under 65) and you’ll find that Ireland and Sweden have very similar death rates.
@Paul Cunningham: They don’t have a sparser population and they don’t have a much higher death rate. Take the tin foil hat off and check your facts.
Next 3 weeks are crucial. Same shpeel for 6 months.
@Monster Munch: https://www.irishtimes.com/news/health/draconian-restrictions-around-covid-19-condemned-by-hse-doctor-1.4352701?mode=amp
‘Much less severe’ than the flu says this doctor.
@Monster Munch: He’s wrong. The vast majority of his colleagues would tell you that.
@ihcalaM: But you are not a doctor so you have no grounds to say that he is wrong.
That is your opinion based on the coolaid that you have been drinking.
Another scaremongerer, dismissing a medical professional, how refreshing!!!
@ihcalaM: He’s talking about the course for the average person. More often than not people that test positive for Covid feel absolutely fine. Where the flu absolutely knocks it out of you for about 10 days.
@Monster Munch: I wonder what the long term impacts are on the organs of those who have had Covid. Any idea? As one of the 470,000 asthmatics in this country I don’t think I would like to contract it thanks. I’m not even frail but my respiratory system would really struggle and I’d be concerned about the longer term impact of it on my body.
@GrumpyAulFella: I don’t know is the honest answer. Someone needs to research that and give more information re who is at risk and why. But I’d prefer to be worried about than to stress about having a lump I couldn’t get checked because screening is on hold.
@Monster Munch: screening is back underway though I think. I just checked cervical screening and it’s back so not really getting the point. I’ve been in 3 times since Mar for respiratory checks and no problems. It’s bound to take a while to fire up in full during a global health pandemic.
@GrumpyAulFella: The point is it should never have been stopped for an illness with a fatality rate of .3%. Sorry to hear about your own troubles. Hope they clear up etc. But I honestly think, if we keep this out of nursing homes, we’ll avoid major problems.
@ed o brien: or dismissing 1 medical ‘professional’ because all his peers say otherwise.Another ignoramus dismissing thousands of medical professionals. How predictable!!!
@Monster Munch: the fatality rate is just under 6%. Higher if you remove those cases that are asymptomatic and would only have been tested because they were close contacts (SARS-COV-2 vs CoViD-19)
@GrumpyAulFella: You, my friend, are very intelligent.
Same ole same ole. We have been spun this (next 3 weeks line) now for way too long .Government have egg all over their faces now because they would not open the pubs in July when the cases were in the low 20s every day day and now they are in the 200s and they will open them because they have no other choice. Watch all the spin coming down the tracks about saving the economy.
PUP well down on its peak which means people are back in work and kids all back in school which means more interaction and more cases.
Stay away from older or vulnerable people and we wont have as many deaths.
Curve flattened weeks/months ago.
Just more rhetoric from the establishment because they are have under invested in our health system for decades.
Its a casedemic now. Why have the deaths almost stopped? Asking for a friend.
@Colum Cusack: and why are our kids being forced to wear masks when there’s hardly anyone even sick from it also asking for a friend
@Colum Cusack: Because people it kills in any great numbers are the very frail. Same with lots of other things we didn’t lose our mind over. 16 or 17 deaths from about 5000 cases in last 2 months…
@Colum Cusack: stopped? There are still over 5,000 deaths a day. Just look at the bigger picture. We have almost no deaths now because of the actions we took. Ironically for all the “we have almost no deaths so open up everything” people are actually proving that keeping things closed has kept the covid-19 death rate lower than countries like the UK, Sweden, France and Spain and Italy. We do have to open slowly and carefully but put the brakes on until we are sure our last actions does not start seeing an increase in serious cases. Our flattened case curve is flat no more.
@Colum Cusack: Funny thing is, the cases started rising 10 weeks ago slowly, the hospital admissions have started rising about 6 weeks ago slowly. The ICU numbers have started rising slowly over the last 2 weeks or so…slowly. we had 3 deaths since the etart of the month…..I hope they stopped and not follow the trends of the other 3….slowly.
Just a thought… most of our deaths have been elderly or vulnerable people. Is it possible that the death rate is low now because these groups of people are actually sticking to government guidelines and are more vigilant than the rest of us. I know my elderly parents are. At present it is mostly under 45s and kids that are contracting it and that is why the deaths are low… Again, just a thought!
The Department of Health has hired a PR company “Teneo” to convey their covid “message “ better.
We need more permanent beds in hospitals, not spin doctors hired ahead of Monday’s announcements for 6 months ( that’s March 2021).
They have no intention of giving up the “special powers” on November 9th. I dread what further restrictions will be applied to people & business & the amount of manipulation they will apply to the messaging to get people to “beg” for more restrictions.
@Isabel Oliveira: AK 47 Alan Kelly brother from Labours xame company that was advising on the privatisation of our water.
@Isabel Oliveira: are these measures unique to Ireland? Just curious.
@Isabel Oliveira: It’s not ridiculous to suggest that the recent surge in cases may be due in part to the infantile and downright insulting tones coming from Glynn and Donnelly.
Grown-up messaging, albeit delivered by spinners, may have a positive effect on buy-in by the public at large and, more pointedly, by younger people.
Just a thought from someone who is tired of being addressed as though I was an imbecile.
78 out of 100,000 isn’t very many.
@Jim Lingk: How many is? People that could have lived another 10/20/30 + years had their lives cut short because of this virus, I’d bet if you or someone you know got sick from it you’d have a very different opinion. A bit of respect for the families of those who lost their battle with this virus wouldn’t go astray.
@Rachel O’ Meara: vast majority of people were in nursing homes. So very unlikely they had anything like another 10 years. Of course it’s sad for families but much sadder for all the other deaths which will be caused by governments over reaction with missed diagnosis and mental health issues.
@james foley: average age of the people that died was 84 with majority having underlining health problems, life expectancy in Ireland is 82, it’s sad, but say you’re right.
@james foley: Doesn’t matter if the elderly had even one more week left, the circumstances they died in not being allowed to have a family member in to hold their hand while they struggled to take their last breath, a final I love you mum/dad/aunt/uncle/friend etc. It doesn’t matter they deserved so much more and the final insult is fools like you saying ah shur they were going to die at some stage anyway. Clearly you have no respect for other people and no respect for life in general. If you were struggling to breath and death was a certainty wouldn’t you at least want your loved ones there in your final moments to comfort you? Grow up, they might just be numbers to you but they represent real lives that people lost to this virus.
@Rachel O’ Meara: plenty of people I know had it. How many people per 100, 000 get cancer? How many of them will die because everything is stopped due to a virus that is killing literally 1′s of people per week.
The difference between 10 in 100,000 and 50 in 100,000 and 200 in 100,000 is statistically irrelevant. In virtually no other field would decisions hinge on such tiny fractions and they are going to propose opening and closing areas based on it.
Wake up.
@james foley: Can I ask, but where are ye getting this information on missed diagnoses? I have had several hospital appoinments during the year, couple of them during the lock down. And actually spent a couple days in hospital during the lockdown and not a Coronavirus reason either. The only appoinment I missed was one I myself put off for a couple months because I didn’t want to add to an already heavily burdened system at the height of it. My mother in her 80′s has had several appoinments during the lock down not missed any. Is it just hearsay your going on? Is there a link I can look at so I can judge for myself?
Kildare was locked down but Dublin get an appeal. Come on govt show some leadership .
@Sean Nihill: have you looked at the ratio of cases:population in Kildare vs Dublin? No comparison! Kildare has a population of 220,000, Dublin 1,300,000.
@Helen Farrell: Kildare, Offaly and Laois were locked down at rates of 82, 80 and 69 per 100,000. Dublin is currently at 73 so it’s well within range of a very similar ratio at which other counties were locked down on.
@Helen Farrell: or have You looked at population density between the 2 counties. Dublin is 10 times that of kildare. Lock it down
@Sean Nihill: Watch “The Hunger Games” and consider yourself lucky..
@Helen Farrell: approximatly 1/4 of the country’s population resides in Dublin, yet in terms of cases, both daily and historically, approximatly 1/2 of all cases are detected there.
Open up everything again, rugby, football, shows, pubs etc, then we might have somewhere to go for fun, but instead there keeping us all locked up ! What do they expect any chance of meeting up with people, we Will jump at it .
And the Irish independent is reporting that the limits on people in our houses will be a maximum of 6 to 10 for the next 7 months no matter how low the cases are.
This is probably also going to apply to travel and hence the comment that we will be “allowed “to travel home for Christmas.
That’s why the government hired a PR firm . Beware of what’s coming as it’s far worse than the pandemic. The government is ready to carry on with draconian & dystopian legislation.
@Isabel Oliveira: let’s hope they do continue to lockdown, and sensibly, as the transmission rate increases. 5,000 cases in Spain alone yesterday, 30,000 deaths in 7 months averaging about 1,000 a week. I think think these restrictions will be unique to Ireland. In fact we know that they won’t.
@Isabel Oliveira: Hopefully the incompetence of our elected officials will shine through as usual and they will back track very quickly. Only few weeks ago we were being told pubs might not open till next year. Never forget these lads are just self serving and only looking to the next election they only see us as votes and nothing else. I can’t see many people actually adhering to the restrictions for 7 months (especially at Xmas) apart from the hard core bed wetters, but unfortunately they seem to shout the loudest.
@Thornto84: i hope you’re correct . I put on RTE Radio and the new advert for restricting your social contacts and your house visits is on , “ assume everybody is infected “ one of the lines . the talk show was about the same topic in total “Univision “ mode. It only teaches people to be afraid of other people & become utterly paranoid. As you correctly say, those petrified by this constant unhealthy fear inducing message hammered into our brains 24/7, shout the loudest.
Feels like the cases are going up in Dublin and it’s not being recorded as it’s mainly young people with moderate symptoms.
@RogersRabbit: That comment makes absolutely no sense, feels like cases are going up in dublin? That’s exactly what’s happening and you also think they are not being recorded? If they are not recorded how in the name of god are we getting new figures every evening?.
@Olivia Smith: An increase in cases outside of what is being reported. But due to the younger demographic who handle it better, the number of cases is underreported. Thanks.
Why isn’t that important “R” number being mentioned now, there was a time we knew the “R” numbers practically everyday? Is it so low hat it doesn’t matter, and yet numbers are climbing? Rather confused by all this!
@Freda Hanratty: it’s in the article I think. It says 1.4.
Dr Glynn says that cases in Dublin will double in a fortnight.
Which cases?
Those hospitalised?
Those admitted to ICU?
Active cases?
Or just those who return a positive test result?
The first two, hospitalisations and ICU cases have remained at a steadily low level since June, despite the increase in reported numbers over the last six weeks.
NPHET have refused to release the figures of active cases since the end of June, so nobody but them can tell if they double.
The numbers of positive test results has increased internationally at the same time as here, and there is growing uncertainty as to what they represent without corresponding increases in hospitalisations and deaths.
Dr Glynn and NPHET need to provide a lot more clarity.
Every 3 weeks he says the next 3 weeks are crucial!
Why are we seeing more cases on the increase
Reasons are. House parties . large groups socialising outside . no face masks . no social distancing. shoppers not wearing masks they think their immune to this virus or mabe just not bothered. Groups of 4 and 5 shopping together last night in Tesco . So irresponsible people will keep the cases increasing while the rest of us try and avoid it . Solution is supermarkets / shops.
. No Mask no entry. No group outing s just for groceries . Full stop.
@patrick hughes: more testing. You forgot that. More children getting tested. Hospital admissions and deaths are both low. Get real
@Jim Lingk: Hospital admissions have been on a steady rise over the last 6/7 weeks. A slow rise I admit, but then the daily newly confirmed cases have been slowly but steadily rising over the last 10 weeks, since the largest lifting of restrictions 11 weeks ago one follows the other.
@Joe_X: yes and the numbers are still tiny. As are the deaths. No deaths at all for nearly a month, then one from June that they forgot to reports, then 3 thay ronan Glynn doesn’t know when they death occurred. It’s a shambles and they need some advice to counter the nonsense coming from NPHET.
@Jim Lingk: we also had miniscule numbers of cases detected for nearly a couple of weeks both before and after the lifting of restrictions on June 29th. Now look where we are. Everything is happening much more slowly than the first time round. I hope the deaths have stopped, but I think it’s more likely, its just a slow increase we are going to see, like the other 3 indicators.
They be ridin’
@Maalouf: Away.
How come Kildare,Laoise & Offaly were served with a shut down, but oh no not Dublin
@Mary Garry: Crazy thing is, us Dubs didnt think it was fair that those counties were locked down due to outbreaks in meat factories, but the old GAA attitude against Dublin is shining brightly outside of the Pale.
Ask yourself though, how many people commute to Dublin for work, hospital appointments etc. Tens of thousands!!
And then they go back home to whatever county they came from.
Take off your county Jersey and see this as a national issue.
As always the sceptics and deniers, almost none of whom have any medical or scientific qualifications, dominate these threads, but the silent majority are just getting on with it.
@Patrick O’Donnell,Irish: Empty vessels make most noise, the same in any situation really.
@Patrick O’Donnell,Irish: I think the silent majority on the Journal don’t agree with the skeptics but only marginally (as evidenced by polls) but outside of journal and internet, the majority of people are either very skeptical of measures or willing to take the risk of life without measures
@Patrick O’Donnell,Irish: how right u are, there is a lot of people on here who seem-to know all the Medical & Scientific Knowledge about the virus more than the WHO or Dr Glynn & all his staff, they should have these jobs _ they would have it sorted in a few day, maybe we should start a petition
@Craig Halpatranags: I almost feel the opposite, as a very noisy minority constantly barrage their poorly constructed opinions about what should be done rather than take advice from the actual medical professionals. We aren’t doing this for fun.
Ronan Glynn is a disgrace to this country.
@Jim Lingk: cop on ,such a statement to make just shows how much u know !
Dubliners, please stay home and try to resist the urge to go the pubs when they open lol!
Swedish people are good at doing their civic duty when asked, unlike a lot of our countrymen
Tone deaf.
And women. Can’t be that good if they have 3 times the amount of cases and deaths than we do.
have your say