Government viability - It’s time to stand up or move on

PUT against the backdrop of last week’s unrelenting bad news, today’s stories of curtailed or closed health services look little more than transient irritations.

However, these proposed closures have the capacity to change lives for the worse. Even so, last week’s series of reality checks underlined how very dangerous our situation has become. It is an unwelcome but sobering indication of how critical a point we have reached when the closure of emergency departments at up to 12 acute hospitals can be considered a second-level difficulty.

Though none of last week’s warnings were new, the depth of crisis revealed demands a response far beyond anything our Government seems capable of generating.