For over 23 months people with disabilities have suffered significantly as a result of actions taken by the HSE that involved the re-deployment of key specialists and care staff to work on COVID 19 to work on swabbing , contact tracing and now we find that the very same specialists will be allocated to work on the National Vaccine Booster Roll-Out Plan with families and carers having to continue to care and support their loved ones as that State continues to abandon them .
As the new Government Vaccine booster Roll-Out is ramped up with a roll-out plan to be ready this week .
The HSE are struggling to find vaccinator’s and have again targeted staff working in specialized areas within the HSE for redeployment and more worryingly are targeting Day Care Services staff to move to the HSE to deliver boosters .
While that roll-out of the COVID 19 Boosters will involve all Government Departments and Agencies along with the Army, the HSE will be leading the operation working with GPs and Health Centres to ensure delivery of the much needed boosters vaccine .
Don’t Leave them behind are very concerned to receive information from employees within the HSE that indicates that the HSE intend to re-deploy key specialists working in Disabilities Services, Mental Health ,Speech & Language ,Occupational and Respite services to work on the National Vaccine Roll-iOut campaign from December..
As the Pandemic arrived in Ireland in March 2020 the HSE abandoned people with disabilities and re-deployed all the key staff required to deliver our services to work on contact tracing and then swabbing .This resulted in carers and families having to arranged support themselves .
At no stage over the past 23 months did we received any assistance or additional financial support from the Government , indeed we discovered this week that the HSE paid section 39 organisation in full for these services never delivered to people in their care .
The National booster Vaccine Roll – Out Plan will be a significant supply chain and logistical operation for Ireland and will require 1000s of additional staff to ensure that it is a success .
The HSE have demonstrated during COVID 19 that they are not capable of planning and managing staff recruitment and ” farm out “ this process to private recruitment agencies at huge cost and mixed results .
We have all witnessed the HSE failure to manage the Test Trace and Track system and the shortage of swabbers and contact tracers as numbers of infections rose.
Their Knee -jerk reaction to staffing issues is to take specialist employees away from key disability services and re-deploy them in COVID 19 areas , these decision are made with no consideration for people with disabilities , their families and carers and have caused significant damage to 1000s of people over the past 23 months .
The fact that we now find that the HSE are attempting to re-deploy these key staff to work on the National Vaccine Booster Roll – Out which will result in the removal of day care and respite services , which will add a number of years to assessment of needs waiting lists and will deprive people with disabilities of key therapists is a source of huge concern for us and we intend to campaign to ensure that this scandalous strategy is not allowed to happen .
If you have an information that you wish to share with us email info@dontleavethembehind.com today