The bed crisis in Irish hospitals is far worse now than it was a decade ago despite intensive campaigning, a nurses' union warned last night.
Mr Dave Hughes, the deputy general secretary of the Irish Nurses Organisation (INO), said staff were now battled and bewildered from working the overcrowded accident and emergency departments.
Mr Hughes said: "Only a broadly based campaign will be sufficient to bring home the message to government that the Health Strategy must be implemented." Accident and Emergency nurses at the INO meeting said the organisation must endorse a campaign - Enough is Enough.
If the campaign is sanctioned by the INO executive council it would involve lunchtime protests beginning on February 22nd in the hospitals affected by beds shortage and patients waiting on trolleys.
The nurses said the protests must involve a massive show of support from the public, patient-interest groups, doctors and all healthcare workers to put pressure on the Government to deliver on the health strategy.
Nurses claimed there were 246 patients on trolleys awaiting admission at hospitals across the country, including at least 14 people sitting on chairs, as it held its meeting this afternoon.
The INO stated: "This represents a catalogue of human misery which nurses can no longer tolerate and which they say is grossly unacceptable in a developed and wealthy country."
The INO will be seeking an emergency meeting with the Minister for Health, Ms Harney, to consider the timeframe for introducing the ten-point plan to tackle the crisis in A&E departments, the proposed delivery of 2,300 acute-care beds, and lifting employment ceilings for nurses.