Covid-19: HSE denies ignoring pleas for help amid claims nursing home was abandoned 

Nightingale Nursing Home in Ballinasloe, where, according to a local GP, 26 out of 28 residents an the majority of staff have tested positive for Covid-19.

The HSE has defended its handling of a Covid-19 outbreak at Nightingale Nursing Home near Ballinasloe, Co Galway, amid criticism that staff and residents were abandoned.

Nightingale Nursing Home’s director of nursing, Patricia MacGabhann, who herself tested positive for the virus, had earlier claimed that, despite multiple pleas to the HSE for support, promised staff had failed to materialise.