The Anglo-Celt Review of the year – April
Abortion services begin at Cavan General Hospital
LOCAL bishops were backing the rights of healthcare workers who chose “not to participate” after full termination of pregnancy services became available at Cavan General Hospital in early April. Cavan was the last public maternity hospital in the country to provide the full service.
The service includes abortions where there is a condition present likely to lead to the death of the foetus either before or within 28 days of birth; and without restriction up to 12 weeks of pregnancy.
“We are saddened by the availability of abortion services in our hospitals. Our hospitals were founded to care for the sick, save and improve our lives, as well as to provide palliative care for those whose life is reaching its natural end,” said a joint statement issued by Bishop Hayes of Kilmore, and Bishop Larry Duffy of Clogher.
Over €18.6M for national road projects in Cavan and Monaghan
CAVAN was allocated over €9.4M in National Roads funding with the long-mooted Virginia bypass project the biggest winner in the county.
A further €9,257,829 has been allocated for Monaghan, bringing the total for the constituency to €18,667,462. The funding was announced last week as part of a total of over €633m allocated to National Roads nationwide.
Buckets collecting rain in Carrick school
THE need for building works at Inver College in Carrickmacross was highlighted at a meeting of the CMETB.
“Further information” was required to consider planning for the proposed building project, members heard in an update.
Board member Lorraine Fealy, who works at Inver College, revealed the school building, which was built in 1959, can have “ten buckets on the corridors” in the old section when it rains.
Sepsis warriors battle on
THREE Cavan women took their campaign to Dáil Éireann to raise Sepsis awareness and campaign for better diagnostic equipment in hospitals. The Sepsis Warriors - Hannah Tormey, Sinead O’Reilly and Catriona Cahill – went above and beyond to raise awareness of the life-threatening disease, which has affected each of their families. The diagnostic machine they are campaigning for would detect bacteria, the type, and the level of it within your blood within 45 minutes. Normally, blood cultures can take 48-72 hours to come back.
Among the stories highlighted were Hannah’s daughter Sophie (18) who thankfully survived Sepsis, largely due to her mother’s persistence in A&E to have blood cultures done.
Cathriona sadly lost her mum, Angela, who passed away suddenly from Sepsis in 2018.
Nine-month backlog for home support hours
DOZENS of elderly and vulnerable people were waiting up to nine months for the provision of home care support in Cavan and Monaghan. In early April, there were 29 people on the waiting list for home support in Cavan; and 35 clients in Monaghan, according to figures obtained by The Anglo-Celt.
Aligned to that there were 102 existing clients waiting on the provision of additional home support hours sanctioned in County Cavan, and 61 in County Monaghan.
In respect of the waiting times, a HSE spokesperson told this newspaper that staff rosters are “continuously reviewed” to ensure services are “operating at optimum capacity”.
Millions to be spent on health projects
MILLIONS were to be spent on progressing plans to develop and upgrade close to a dozen significant health projects in Cavan over the coming year. The details were contained in the HSE’s Capital Plan 2025. Locally they included major investment plans for Cavan General Hospital, with upgrades to the Emergency Department, Oncology, Endoscopy, Acute Psychiatric, as well as a suite of community services for older people, palliative care, and disability services.