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THERE ARE OVER 1,300 vacant nursing and midwifery posts in Irish hospitals due to the HSE’s effective recruitment freeze, the INMO has said today.
Phil Ní Sheaghdha of the Irish Nurses and Midwives Organisation has said the figures demonstrate that the government is “refusing to fill frontline healthcare posts” and that patient care is being compromise as a result.
Across staff nursing and midwifery in acute hospitals, 7% of funded posts are vacant, with 1,251 vacancies out of 17,623 posts.
Midwifery is being hardest hit with one in six (17%) funded staff midwife posts now vacant, with 284 vacancies in a workforce of 1,687.
The INMO says that care for the elderly and those with an intellectual disability is also being affected by 420 vacancies in community health services.
The union met with the HSE on Friday evening to call for curtailment of services until staffing reaches safe levels.
“The figures are stark: the government are refusing to fill frontline healthcare posts,” Ní Sheaghdha said following that meeting.
Graduating nurses and midwives are considering their employment options as we speak. Yet despite repeated public promises from the Minister for Health that they would all have full-time permanent jobs upon graduation, the majority have not received offers or contracts.
The HSE has rejected the claim that a recruitment freeze is in place and told TheJournal.ie that “controls” were in place on recruitment.
Health Minister Simon Harris told the Dáil in May that he believed that the controls put in place by the HSE were “sensible”
Harris had also the controls would remain in place until the end of June but a HSE spokesperson has now said they will stay in place pending further budgetary assurances.
- With reporting by Sean Murray
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Personally anyone who constantly posts their every move and keep checking to see how many likes they get, must be very low on self esteem. Plus the fact that they’re telling all in sundry that their home is vacant.
Mute Go on Leo, go ahead and try enforced payment durin
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Jul 15th 2023, 11:16 AM
@Paul Cunningham: in between a record June and a heatwave predicted… forget that? On the subject, social media has done untold damage to society. Any potential positives in terms of social engagement are by far outdone by the negatives of this type of constant comparison anxiety and of course directly negative commentary. Then you think of the distraction it causes, and the impact of that on kids who aren’t getting the attention they need because parents need to maintain the image. It’s one big ‘look at me’ fest and extremely unhealthy.
I watched a film last night on channel 4 – I am Ruth – mainly focused on her daughter and her obsession with social media, her need for self affirmation through ‘likes’ on her posts, the negative effects mentally it took on her when she was trolled, the ripple effect all of this had on her family – I thought the end was very powerful, the girl struggled but she destroyed her phone, an effort to take back control of her life.
Christmas is another online anxiety-fest. It usually starts with the first tree going up in September as the family ‘make memories ‘ in matching reindeer jumpers.
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