The first case of coronavirus has been confirmed in the North in a patient who travelled via Dublin on their way home from Italy.

Almost 557,000 patients are waiting for a first hospital consultation and thousands more have joined the queue over the last two months, it has emerged.

Crumlin Children’s Hospital in Dublin is dealing with more flu cases, respiratory viruses, and the winter vomiting bug.

Once upon a time, we put our unquestioning trust in our doctors, in our healthcare service. But a revolution has been happening, quietly, unstoppable.

The number of patients waiting to see a hospital consultant has reached a new record high of almost 570,000.

The Government is facing claims of going “back to the future” by announcing plans to scrap the overarching HSE and replace it with six regional health structures which mirror the health boards ditched 15 years ago.

Latest waiting list figures from the National Treatment Purchase Fund show that they continued to climb this month, reaching 558,484 last week.

A patient advocacy group says it is deeply disappointing the Government may decide against introducing ‘statutory open disclosures’, a legal obligation on doctors and health professionals to tell patients when there has been a serious failing in their care.

There were almost 500 notifiable incidents in HSE hospitals last year, which included deaths, sexual assaults and medical errors.

Concerns have been raised about the implications of Brexit for patients travelling to Britain for medical treatment.

An orthopaedic surgeon whose operating lists have been cancelled for the past three months has written to every member of the Dáil warning that the health minister’s policy to end the trolley crisis is not working.

Fianna Fáil leader Micheal Martin has accused the Government of standing over a “fraudulent” health budget which has the sole intention of whitewashing the health crisis before the general election.

The State would face a €1bn medical negligence bill every 12 months if the number of people to die unnecessarily or who are further injured because of delays due to overcrowding at emergency departments sued.

A leading hospital has been accused of practicing "third-world" medicine on its wards, after a clothes hanger was used to hang up a seriously ill patient’s IV drip on a lamp shade.

Older people had lost their medical cards in the past year without a proper financial assessment, a patients’ advocate claimed.

The HSE must publish a monthly hospital breakdown providing full details of when surgical items are ‘lost’ or wrongly left inside people if it genuinely wants to improve patient safety.

Ministers who give grants to groups in their own constituencies without explaining why should be accused of "geographical top-ups" in the same way as charity officials have been criticised for misusing public money.

HSE plans to save money by filling key hospital roles with interns and graduate nurses is putting budgets before patients’ lives.

A major medical review is under way over claims more than 20 women suffered alleged “severe post-operative complications” after being treated by a leading private sector consultant.

Charges for prescription medicines for medical card holders are to increase by 66%.

The Data Protection Commissioner has been urged to open an immediate investigation into how HSE patient files are protected, after a string of unencrypted records were lost or stolen from the system.

Dozens of HSE laptops, USB sticks, and smartphones with sensitive, unencrypted files have been stolen or lost once every three weeks since senior officials insisted the problem had been solved.

Stolen and missing HSE laptops containing sensitive files are just the latest in a long line of problems with the service’s data security, writes FiachraÓ Cionnaith.

The HSE has been criticised for unnecessary secrecy over the CJD scare at Beaumont Hospital after management refused to answer basic questions about the incident.

The illegal online counterfeit drugs trade may be worth as much as €70bn a year worldwide — with Irish sales unwittingly helping to fund crime gangs as far afield as Russia and China.

The high cost of legitimate drugs is forcing a record number of people to gamble with their lives by seeking out cheaper black market medications online.

The findings of the probe into Savita Halappanavar’s death provoked alarm across the political spectrum.

HSE cutbacks are forcing hospitals to treat public patients in mixed-gender wards — a situation support groups claim is an affront to their dignity.

Advocacy experts have warned that slashing funding to interest groups could damage society and said many in the sector believed their funding was at risk if they were too critical of Government departments and State agencies.

The equivalent of one-in-12 people in Ireland are forced to wait for outpatient hospital appointments — including almost 10,000 people unable to access care for more than four years.

The HSE has inadvertently highlighted how it manages upcoming negative news after accidently including the Irish Examiner in a group email to senior officials.

The family of Savita Halappanavar has put further pressure on the Indian government to encourage Ireland to open an independent inquiry into her death.

Health Minister James Reilly has been urged to scrap the existing HSE inquiry into Savita Halappanavar’s death by asking the Health Information Quality Authority to take over its control.

The HSE’s financial problems have surged to €300m, with hospitals €151m over- budget and the medical card scheme €92m in the red.

Hospital patients may have to eat outsourced frozen meals from another part of the country as part of cost-cutting measures.

More than 76,000 people have quit their private health insurance in the past year, with record numbers getting medical cards.

Seriously ill patients could be set to face even deeper cuts to their care after it emerged the HSE is already €89m over budget for this year.

Seriously ill patients could be set to face even deeper cuts to their care after it emerged that the HSE is already €89m over budget for this year.

The practice of clamping vehicles outside hospitals would be scrapped while clampers would have to engage in an appeals process under proposals to overhaul the industry.

Cannabis-based medicinal products, such as Sativex, could soon be available to people with multiple sclerosis and other medical conditions on prescription.

Surgeries will be cancelled in public hospitals to cope with the exodus of health staff under the Government’s early retirement scheme.

Health Minister James Reilly will come under increasing pressure to introduce proposals for universal health insurance as more people are priced out of the private health insurance market, a leading patient advocate has warned.