1,100 HSE West staff off sick daily

AN AVERAGE of 1,100 HSE West staff are out sick every day, the Health Service Executive (HSE) has confirmed.

The HSE’s assistant national director for finance, Liam Minihan, has confirmed that the 1,100 staff calling in sick every day from Donegal to Limerick is costing the service €5 million a month.

“We must have very sick people in the HSE . . . . It is the people outside the hospitals, the workers, who are very sick,” the chairman of HSE West Forum, Pádraig Conneely (FG), said. At the HSE West Forum’s September meeting, he added: “It is not acceptable and costing €5 million per month. It is obviously too easy in the public service to call in sick.”

HSE West’s regional director of operations, John Hennessy, said 5 per cent of staff were out sick at any one time. HSE West employed 22,000 permanent staff and “a very comprehensive programme of absenteeism management” was under way. “The stark reality of it is that 5 per cent are off sick. Half of that are from frontline services where there is pressure to replace and cost is a factor.