Services resume at two Covid-hit hospitals in Limerick and Clare

Outpatient services and elective activity at University Hospital Limerick (pictured) and Ennis Hospital resume today. File picture: Dan Linehan

Services are to resume at two hospitals in the University of Limerick Hospital Group (ULHG) as staff return to work after Covid-19 outbreaks.

However, 133 members of staff remain absent, having either tested positive for the virus or because they were considered close contacts of a positive case.

A spokesperson confirmed the figures, which include all six hospitals, were accurate as of Monday morning.

The figures were down from those recorded on Monday, November 16, when 221 staff members were absent due to being sick, or self-isolating.

This shows that 88 people have returned to work at ULHG in the past week.

The news comes as outpatient services and elective activity at University Hospital Limerick and Ennis Hospital resume, as of Tuesday, November 24.

📻Colette Cowan, CEO @ULHospitals updated @LimerickToday's Joe Nash yesterday on services, infection prevention and control measures in place amid outbreak of #COVID19

Listen back➡️https://t.co/EIpFrKEuq6

— HSE Mid West (@HSEMidWest) November 24, 2020

According to the spokesperson, testing and tracing are still ongoing across the group.

“The swabbing of all clinical staff across the group, prioritised in the first phase of our response, is now almost complete,” they added.

Temperature monitoring of staff is also in place across all the group sites.

“While we don’t comment in detail on the specifics of our Covid-19 response plans, we continue to follow all relevant national public health and occupation health guidance from the Health Protection Surveillance Centre (HPSC) and the HSE Workplace Health and Wellbeing Unit,” a spokesperson said.

“The steady and ongoing tracking down of the level of staff absent across the group has been such that last Friday, the Group’s Hospital Crisis Management moved to resume outpatient services and elective activity at UHL and Ennis Hospital from today, Tuesday, November 24,” they added.