Air Corps support to HSE on Covid tests stood down

The Air Corps was deployed almost every weekend in January to deliver Covid-19 test samples to a laboratory in Germany.

Air Corps assistance for the HSE has been temporarily stood down.

The agency has been using pilots to deliver Covid-19 test samples to a laboratory in Germany.

The flights were necessary to beat the backlog caused by the huge post-Christmas spike in cases.

Although the Air Corps had flown a few missions to the laboratory in Munich during 2020 for the HSE, it was deployed almost every weekend in January.

Last weekend saw its last flight for the foreseeable future from Casement Aerodrome, Baldonnel, to Germany.

It carried out around 15 such flights from Baldonnel since the start of the year.

“The Irish Air Corps as the principal agency for delivering aviation services to the State has a long history of working with other government agencies," said an Air Corps spokesperson.

“In this work, we are proud to support our fellow citizens in the fight against this pandemic."

As well as delivering PPE and other supplies to Defence Forces troops serving abroad, the Air Corps has also been used to deliver vaccines.

As well as delivering PPE and other supplies to Defence Forces troops serving abroad, the Air Corps has also been used to deliver vaccines.

In January, the Air Corps carried out its first aeromedical transfer of an intensive care unit patient with Covid-19.

Last December, the HSE was so inundated with people looking for a test that it told people to assume they have Covid-19 when they develop any symptoms and isolate before getting their test result.

At the time, the level of transmission was so high that people were more likely to have Covid-19 than at any other time in the pandemic.

Although the HSE said testing would continue, the system was nearing full capacity.

A short while later, the HSE urged people to stop attending Covid-19 test centres without an appointment or a referral from a GP after it saw an increase in numbers arriving and asking for a test.

A letter sent to GPs from the HSE stated that since December 23, there had been a "notable increase" in the number of service users attending the test centres without a referral.

It said this was putting significant pressure on testing services and was leading to long delays and “poor service user experience”.