A Health Information and Quality Authority report into a Donegal nursing home where seven residents died of flu, has found there was no established procedure to enable early detection of influenza.

The number of patients who have died as a result of a flu outbreak at a Co Donegal nursing home has risen to seven.

The HSE was not alerted to a spate of deaths at a private nursing home in Donegal until all six patients had died.

HSE guidelines warn that the type of virus which caused a lethal nursing home outbreak could spread rapidly in enclosed settings and, among older people, may not be stopped by the flu jab.

An investigation into how a serious flu outbreak at a private nursing home led to the deaths of six residents and infected 27 others will focus on why the facility failed to inform authorities of the crisis in time.

A victim of child abuse at a Belfast-based Catholic institution is calling for a full inquiry in the North along the same lines as the Commission on Child Abuse in the Republic.

Two policing board members clashed today on the eve of a meeting between Irish President Mary McAleese and the North’s most senior police officer in Belfast.