Record overcrowding is expected in hospitals in the new year, senior Government sources believe, amid a surge of infections across Ireland.
It is expected the situation will deteriorate before the new year and be “very bad” in early January and the following weeks.
Extra beds, staff and funding as well as the use of the private health system “won’t be enough to hold back the tide”, a senior source said.
It comes as a fresh wave of Covid-19 in China sparked renewed discussions on Thursday at European level on potential travel restrictions, and while no measures were advised, it is expected talks will resume next week.
Government sources emphasised that the preference would be to move in step with the European Union and the United Kingdom if travel measures are imposed, and that the meeting had not advised any new measures on travel guidance. Following a meeting of the EU Health Security Committee on Thursday, the European Commission stressed the importance of co-ordinated action. Italy announced mandatory testing for all air arrivals from China on Wednesday.
A crisis meeting of senior HSE executives held on Thursday was told that attendances, admissions and wait times were all significantly up on 2019, the most recent pre-Covid year, with the chief clinical officer Dr Colm Henry saying there was “no sign yet that we have reached the peak”.
There is an expectation that elective surgeries may be curtailed or moved to hospitals without emergency departments. A Government source said masking guidelines remained just advisory “at the minute”, while a HSE source said they believed no policy changes were currently in the offing.
A combined surge of flu, Covid and other illnesses is driving demand for health services “well above levels we have seen before”, HSE chief executive Stephen Mulvany said after the meeting of the National Crisis Management Team (NCMT).
Lower numbers of people getting Covid vaccine boosters are causing concern, with the HSE on Thursday opening access to a second booster dose for those aged 18-49. For the first time, vaccines are to be made available for children aged four and under who have underlying conditions, are immunocompromised or are at risk of contracting Covid.
HSE modelling shown to Ministers last week showed more than 900 flu cases in hospital at the end of the month or in early January, and anything from 700-1,200 hospitalised with Covid over the same period. It is not known if that is a worst-case scenario.
The HSE said in a statement that the surge in respiratory illness “will continue to seriously impact our hospitals and emergency departments” and place primary care services like GPs and out of hours family doctors under pressure.
Figures shown on Thursday to the recently-established NCMT show a 22.2 per cent increase in Covid cases in the week to Christmas Day and a 99 per cent increase in flu. Hospital attendances increased by 9 per cent versus 2019, with admissions up 5.4 per cent.
There was a significant deterioration in the number of people waiting for 24 hours or more, up 26 per cent or 13,626 on the same week in 2019. Those waiting 75 hours or more saw a similar deterioration of 27 per cent, or 4,580 breaches of this threshold.
Government sources said the situation was similar across northern Europe, but the Opposition rounded on the Coalition. Sinn Féin health spokesman David Cullinane said the crisis was predicted this summer and said Minister for Health Stephen Donnelly was “limping from one winter plan to the next and is in crisis management mode”.
The Irish Nurses and Midwives Organisation called for measures to be introduced to protect the physical and mental wellbeing of frontline health staff. ”Our hospitals have never seen this level of activity at this time of year with high levels of overcrowding impacting care in hospitals large and small,” general secretary Phil Ní Sheaghdha said.
