HSE chief says public health nurse workforce down since 2019 causing ‘problem’ for child development checks

It follows a story from the Irish Independent this week that babies in parts of the country are at risk of falling through the cracks and missing milestone development checks as public health nurse services for small children have collapsed across swathes of the country.

“Our public health nursing workforce is down 28 full-time equivalents since the end of 2019, we have 1,511 at the moment, because some of them were part time and so on,” Mr Gloster told RTÉ’s This Week.

“We’re down about 44 people. The main problem is in the three regions we have that feed into the greater Dublin area, the rest of the country is not particularly a problem,” he said.

“Childhood developmental check are essentially important. They are important for detection of early challenges and developmental milestones for children.

“They are also important in promoting positive health in terms of those children when they become adults having less prevalence of things like chronic disease.”

Public health…

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Independent.ie