Harney: I will not intervene in hospital row

THE Minister for Health, Mary Harney has said she won’t be intervening at Cork University Hospital (CUH) where a public row has broken out over the quality and effectiveness of management at the hospital.

“I am not going to adjudicate as between whose responsibility this is — management or consultant. It is not very encouraging for patients, or for anybody else, to see these public squabbles. I wish they would resolve their difficulties. Good hospitals are run on the basis that everybody works together,” said Ms Harney.

“I know there are issues in Cork because we are moving cancer from one place to another and not everybody is in agreement with that. This is one of the best-funded hospitals in the country and funding has been hugely enhanced in CUH in recent years and, as it happens, it is one of the five hospitals that are not fully co-operating with the NTPF [National Treatment Purchase Fund] so I think there are a lot of issues that everybody in the hospital should work together around,” she added.