Madam, - I write in support of Prof Harry Kennedy's commonsense suggestion (March 13th) of a campus-style location for hospital development in a "health park" that would be accessible from major motorways and would, as he said, "eventually absorb all the specialist hospitals, medical schools and health sciences for the eastern part of the country."
This makes sense on two vital grounds. Financially it would begin the process of making sure of sufficient capacity to meet the growing health needs of our population in modern buildings that could be built to the highest specification in terms of energy, medical technology, and hygiene - eg MRSA free.
Equally vital, however, is the provision of a greenfield site that would allow patients to be treated in a sympathetic environment. As the Taoiseach has reminded us lately, we also have souls - so it follows that people are more than a collection of symptoms to be treated in a building of excellently equipped air-conditioned rooms. These are, of course, essential, but are not enough.
All of us need access to fresh air and the ordinary but necessary green and growing world that is a part of our very being. To deprive children of this seems particularly insensitive. Surely a high-rise building with windows that look out on city streets and need to be kept closed because of noise and the pollution is acceptable only if nothing better can be provided.
Is this the best we can do? - Yours, etc,
CARMEL GRIMLEY, Manor Rise, Dublin 16.