O’Loan: It is right to send intensive care patients to England

Ballymena SDLP councillor Declan O’Loan has warned against a knee-jerk reaction about the adequacy of intensive care provision in Northern Ireland after a sick child was airlifted to an English hospital. Without commenting on the merits of this particular case, he believes that in general such an approach to health provision is sensible.

Councillor O’Loan said, “The level of demand for acute hospital provision is very variable. This is particularly true for specialisms within the service. It does not make sense to build in provision locally for the peak of every demand. That is why I welcome the use of hospitals in Dublin and Edinburgh for planned surgery. At times the traffic flow will be the other way. A complete self-contained health system cannot be built in a small place like Northern Ireland.

We should resist quick conclusions that our health service is in a mess when an incident like the recent one occurs.”