Donie's Ireland daily news BLOG

HSE paying out €70k each day on private taxis

CAB COMPANIES PAID €73M IN THREE YEARS FOR TRANSPORTING PATIENTS

    

THE HSE SPENDS OVER €70,000 A DAY ON TAXIS – WITH ONE FIRM LAST YEAR RECEIVING ALMOST €1M.

Latest figures show total spend in the past three years has reached some €73m.

Documents obtained by the Sunday Independent show that the agency – which is under unprecedented financial pressure – is now one of the highest users of taxis in western Europe.

The revelation comes just three weeks after an additional €500m was agreed as the latest “special payment” to keep the country’s health services afloat.

And earlier this year it emerged we proportionately spend more on health than any other OECD country – fuelling ongoing speculation the service is not delivering on a value-for-money basis.

Now these latest figures – arising from a Freedom of Information request – show that outlay on taxis continues to escalate. It will renew speculation that there should be more cost-effective methods of transporting patients – and items such as blood specimens – for example, by expanding the ambulance service.

The cost is for transferring patients by private taxi when they are too ill, frail, or unable to travel unaccompanied, to and from appointments.

Figures reveal two taxi companies in Dublin netted almost €1m each over a 12-month period as a result of payments by the HSE.

A third firm in the capital earned over €600,000 – while another taxi company was paid €550,000. A number of taxi firms around the country were also high earners.

Over the course of a year, a firm in Cork earned €755,000 from the health service – and six other taxi companies in the area had earnings ranging from €200,000 to €390,000.

A trawl through the records reveals the biggest earner in the Limerick region received just under €435,000.

Four other taxi, minibus, and hackney firms in the area earned amounts ranging from €150,000 to €214,000 in the space of a year.

Stephen McMahon, of the Irish Patients’ Association, said while transportation should be made available for vulnerable patients, the HSE must ensure they are getting “value for money”.

“Many patients struggle to get from their home to a hospital so we must provide a service for them to do that.

“We don’t know if we’re getting value for money. Are these patients being charged premium rates?

“Do the drivers have experience in basic first-aid? The HSE should think outside the box and consider having their own transportation system attached to the ambulance service.”

Fianna Fail health spokesman Billy Kelleher said it should be acknowledged that “tying up high-end emergency care vehicles and ambulances for transferring patients” is not an option.

“But equally there’s an obligation on the HSE to ensure that they are getting the best value for the taxpayer. Getting value for money should be a key priority. There should be regular audits carried out, and there should be very clear, efficient, and effective tendering, in place as well.”

In a statement, the HSE said the figures provided only include the cost of hiring taxis that comes strictly within its legal ambit. Further expenditure on taxis is incurred by other agencies linked to the overall health service.

Specific data which would show the cost of transporting patients to and from acute hospitals is not available, the statement added.

Mary Tierney of Patient Focus, said ideally all drivers should be capable of basic first aid, which they could use if needed in an emergency situation.

Ireland will resist EU pressure to cut milk output, says Minister Creed

‘FINGER-POINTING AT IRELAND’ UNJUSTIFIED, SAYS MICHAEL CREED AHEAD OF EU MEETING

   

Minister for Agriculture Michael Creed with Enda Kenny.

Minister for Agriculture Michael Creed said Ireland would resist mounting EU pressure to scale back its milk production at this week’s Farm Council meeting in Brussels. The Republic has been singled out as one of the chief drivers of overproduction in Europe, which is now blamed for the current turmoil in dairy markets.

However, Mr Creed said the “finger-pointing at Ireland” was entirely unjustified given the country accounted for 4 per cent of production in Europe and 1% globally.

The latest statistics show the industry here increased output by 18.5% to 6.5 billion litres in the first 12 months since the ending of milk quotas in April last year.

Germany and France, Europe’s two largest producers, recorded more modest output increases of 3.7% and 1.3%, but their production footprints, at 31 billion litres and 25 billion litres respectively, dwarf Ireland’s output.

Compulsory cuts

The Government has resisted restricting supply fearing Ireland, so long the under-achiever in the global milk market, would cede ground to rivals.

Mr Creed said that with the exception of the one dairy lobby group, the Irish Creamery Milk Suppliers’ Association (ICMSA), there was no appetite in Ireland to go down the route of voluntary or compulsory cuts in production. Germany, France and Poland are expected to propose new measures, including supply controls, at this week’s Farm Council meeting aimed at rebalancing the market, amid a near 40% drop in global milk prices since 2014.

The three countries agreed a joint position at a crisis meeting in Warsaw earlier this month and are likely to call on the European Commission to fund voluntary supply cuts at local and national levels.

Income support

Two recent Global Dairy Trade auctions posted modest price increases, prompting suggestions the market may be finally bottoming out, the latest auction in mid-June recorded no change in price. Despite the introduction of several income support measures, several large Irish processors have been accused of short-changing farmers on price.

A recent survey by the Dutch Dairy Board found Irish dairy processors,Glanbia, Dairygold and Kerry, were paying the lowest prices for milk in Europe.

Some 30,000 applicants scramble for €9 an hour Cival Service office jobs

    

ALMOST 30,000 PEOPLE HAVE APPLIED FOR THE MOST BASIC CLERICAL JOB IN THE CIVIL SERVICE WHERE PAY HAS PLUMMETED TO €9 AN HOUR.

Almost 30,000 people – including thousands of third-level graduates – have applied for the most basic clerical job in the civil service where pay has plummeted to €9 an hour.

Many workers are still scrambling for “a permanent, pensionable state job with a family friendly working environment”, according to recruitment experts.

A clerical officer recruitment drive two years ago attracted 28,500 hopefuls.

The avalanche of applications to become part of the public service was the largest since 1993 when there was a recruitment drive at the tail-end of the last major downturn.

But this time round, when applications closed on June 17, an unprecedented 29,811 had applied.

Clerical officers perform administrative and clerical duties, and are expected to complete tasks such as typing, data input computer work and filing.

Despite the unprecedented number of applicants, it is understood the Public Appointments Service is looking to fill fewer than 1,000 positions countrywide. It is also believed the majority of the vacancies are based in Dublin.

During the Celtic Tiger years, similar front-line positions were difficult to fill, and the majority of successful candidates had left education right after they completed the Leaving Certificate.

Appointments were made without the requirement of a formal interview.

Given the high number of applications following this latest recruitment drive, it could be some months before the successful candidates begin employment.

Speaking today, Michael McDonagh, director of Hays Recruitment Agency in Dublin, says workers are still “hugely attracted” to a guaranteed income provided in the semi-state and state sector.

“All the pain endured since the economic crash has made many people really attracted by the idea of what is described as the permanent, pensionable job,” he added.

Talking therapy is on rise? but who are we talking to?

THERE IS A BEWILDERING CHOICE OF THERAPISTS AND THERAPIES OUT THERE – BUT LITTLE REGULATION

     

There is little regulation of the therapy market.

TALK THERAPY MAY BE ON THE RISE IN IRELAND, BUT CLIENTS STILL AREN’T ASKING THEIR THERAPISTS ABOUT THEIR QUALIFICATIONS AND ACCREDITATIONS.

While Irish people may euphemistically concede that they are “talking to someone”, they often don’t know who exactly that person is, or what the letters after their name mean.

There is a bewildering choice of therapists and therapies available in Ireland, coupled with a woeful lack of consumer information. Furthermore, psychotherapists and counsellors are not currently regulated under the Health and Social Care Professionals Act 2005.

“The persistent lack of regulation in psychotherapy is profoundly concerning,” says cognitive scientist and philosopher of medicine Dr Charlotte Blease.

“There is still no statutory regulation for therapists in Ireland (though there are moves in this direction with CORU). And unlike medicine, it is not possible to become a licensed psychotherapist.

“Anyone can stick a plaque on their door, set up an internet site, dub themselves a ‘therapist’ and start charging by the hour. I also imagine that many of these people are falsely calling themselves ‘Dr’ or even ‘Professor’,” she adds.

Counselling and psychotherapy are self-regulated industries in Ireland. Just as psychology is accredited by associations such as the Psychological Society of Ireland (PSI), counselling and psychotherapy are accredited by bodies such as the Irish Association for Counselling and Psychotherapy (IACP); the Irish Association of Humanistic & Integrative Psychotherapy (IAHIP); and the Association of Psychoanalysis and Psychotherapy in Ireland (APPI).

These bodies have stringent standards of excellence and therapists are required to partake in a mandatory number of client contact-work hours (450 hours for prospective IACP members) after successful completion of core work.

“Psychotherapists who are members of bodies such as the IACP, and similar organisations, must adhere to strict ethical codes of conduct to respect patient autonomy, client confidentiality, and to conduct themselves in a professional manner,” says Dr Blease.

Non-membership doesn’t disqualify therapists from practicing though, as psychotherapist and Love Rewired author David Kavanagh explains.

“People can do a course that is accredited to a proper organisation but then not necessarily go off and get the proper registration hours that they need. If they don’t get the registration hours that they need, then they are not officially registered.”

Kavanagh’s clients often ask him to explain the difference between a counsellor and a psychotherapist.

“I always answer ‘about seven years’ training’. I have a degree, a diploma, three years post-grad and then two years to get registration. It was a nine-year educational process for me to become a psychotherapist with the Family Therapy Association of Ireland.

“Yet I could become a counsellor in six months after doing my Leaving Cert. Or I could do a six- week course in counselling online, get a certificate from America, put myself forward and nobody is legislating against me.”

Dublin-based psychotherapist Liam Plant, who is accredited with three bodies, both here and in the UK, believes that therapists are ethically obliged to tell clients if they are still in the process of becoming accredited. He also offers a list of ‘questions to ask your therapist’ on his website.

“There was a proliferation in the noughties of private colleges offering courses that maybe didn’t pay sufficient attention to the highest standards of practice,” says Plant. “I personally think the minimum level of education should be a Masters.”

Thankfully, the Irish industry is slowly moving in this direction. The IACP is increasing the minimum educational requirement for Counselling & Psychotherapy (for the purpose of accreditation) to Degree Level 8 on the National Framework of Qualifications from September 2018.

This will significantly up the ante of an already challenging programme, says copywriter Laura-Kelly Walsh, who is currently studying part-time for an IACP-recognised diploma in psychotherapy over two years. Her studies include 450 hours of training, 50 hours of personal therapy and 150 hours of supervised practice.

“I realised how important it is to do an IACP or IAHIP accredited course after researching the courses available in Ireland,” she explains. “Also, given the nature of the profession, an online course was out of the question.”

Psychotherapist Barbara Foley became IACP-accredited a year ago. She originally trained as a nurse before working in clinical research for 12 years. She started a degree in psychotherapy six years ago, practiced for two years before becoming fully accredited and is currently studying for a two-year post-grad in adolescent psychotherapy.

“My concern is the rise of online courses in things like CBT [cognitive behavioural therapy], NLP [Neuro-linguistic programming] and mindfulness,” she says. “I’m not aware of the accreditation around them and I just wonder how vigilant people are about researching the regulatory process.”

Dr Blease has similar reservations.

“A friend of mine suggested going to ‘mindfulness classes’. I went along with her twice, purely out of curiosity for the standard of care. I was appalled. I have no idea what kind of training he received and I witnessed this ‘therapist’ tell one patient (who had made it known that he was grieving) that, ‘cancer is caused by the food that we eat’.”

“The problem with Ireland is that people don’t ask enough,” adds Kavanagh. “They don’t say ‘tell me about your qualifications and expertise’. They don’t ask ‘where did you train, who did you register with, are you insured?'”

Foley agrees. She says that while GPs will only refer patients to registered psychotherapists, clients are considerably less ¬attentive about looking for ¬accreditations. One way to navigate this is to find a reputable centre. MyMind, a not-for-profit provider of mental health care services, requires all therapists to be practicing under a recognised accreditation body and to be undergoing regular supervision.

“Finding a therapist in your area can be done through consulting the directories of professional bodies,” explains MyMind communications officer Carmel Bryce. “It can also be helpful to have a recommendation from a trusted source, such as a GP or friend.”

Patients should also be educated about the therapeutic process and the possible risks, says Dr Blease.

“They deserve to be made known about evidence which shows that some versions of therapy will be more suitable for their problems than other kinds of therapy.

“They also deserve to be told that therapy may carry risks: around 10pc of patients experience worsening of symptoms as a result of long-term therapy. Honest and competent therapists – therapists who are working within the sphere of evidence-based practice – will make patients aware of these facts.

“Just because psychotherapy involves talking does not mean it is harmless.”

In vitro fertilisation may save coral reef decline

    

MARINE BIOLOGISTS AT THE CALIFORNIA ACADEMY OF SCIENCES HAVE JOINED A NEW INTERNATIONAL EFFORT TO RESCUE ENDANGERED CORAL REEFS FROM THE CONSEQUENCES OF WIDESPREAD HUMAN DESTRUCTION AND A WARMING CLIMATE.

Teams of research divers from the academy will set off this summer on expeditions to the Caribbean and Mexico, where they will seed two of the region’s major reefs with millions of coral larvae born from the organisms’ sperm and egg cells.

As colorful as flower bouquets, corals are actually colonies of tiny animals that build their limestone homes from the sea, and derive their colors from the algae that live inside them. Their lives are increasingly threatened by global plagues like expanding human development, ocean pollution, and the twin signals of global climate change: rising temperatures and increasing ocean acidification.

A call to action from three Pacific island nations whose coral reefs are in the crosshairs of the largest and longest-lasting coral bleaching event in recorded history will be presented Friday at the conclusion of the International Coral Reef Symposium in Honolulu. Heads of state from Palau, Micronesia and the Marshall Islands attended the conference and provided a plan to help save their ailing coral reefs, which are major contributors to their local economies and the daily sustenance of their people. The call to action, signed by the three presidents, asked for better collaboration between the scientific community and local governments, saying there needs to be more funding and a strengthened commitment to protecting the reefs.

Recent record-shattering El Niños have raised Pacific Ocean temperatures and caused a new worldwide episode of coral bleaching that is turning the organisms dead white. The scourge began in 2014, according to the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration, and is already the worst and longest bleaching episode in history.

Bart Shepherd, the director of the academy’s Steinhart Aquarium, and Luiz Rocha, the curator of ichthyology, will lead about 20 divers on a new experiment in coral reproduction.

“If it’s successful,” Shepherd said, “it opens the possibility for widespread application on coral reefs everywhere.”

Shepherd’s group has joined with leaders of an international research and conservation group called Secore International — Sexual Coral Reproduction — whose founder and president, Dirk Petersen, led the original research into a unique method of in vitro fertilization of coral organisms.

Five years ago, Petersen and researchers diving at the Caribbean Marine Biological Institute in Curacao, collected coral sperm and egg cells in the water while the corals were spawning, and reared the coral larvae in the laboratory. When they matured, the researchers transplanted the coral larvae onto small, fist-size tiles that the divers then transplanted to the degraded reef by the thousands.

The experiment was successful and within two years a high proportion of new corals were flourishing and growing, Petersen and his colleagues reported in the journal Global Ecology and Conservation.

“This is now actually a five-year plan, and eventually it could become a global restoration project for corals everywhere,” Petersen said during a recent visit to San Francisco, where he and Shepherd completed working on details of the academy team’s role this summer.

The expedition is scheduled for August because the corals spawn only about once a year, releasing their sex cells into the water by the millions, Shepherd explained. The event, he said, occurs only in August at night and only within a few days after a full moon.

It’s during those fleeting nights of spawning action that Shepherd and his colleagues from the academy will be diving to collect the coral gametes. Then, after they have become larvae in the Caribbean institute’s lab, the divers will return to seed the nearby reef with the fresh infant corals.

The researchers’ first two targets will be on the degraded reef at the institute’s field station in Curacao, and then on the Yucatan Peninsula, where the famed Great Maya Reef stretches more than 620 miles south to the coast of Belize.

The academy’s effort at coral midwifery is part of a $10 million commitment the institution has made specifically to research and restoration efforts on the world’s endangered reefs.

“We’re planning 20 new expeditions over the next five years to regions where coral reefs are threatened,” said Jonathan Foley, the academy’s executive director. “And our people will be putting boots on the ground for a rescue experiment that’s unique — not just for proving out a new technique to restore coral reefs, but for making the technique better.”