The recruitment and retention crisis in the HSE has led to 1.3 million people being left on health service waiting lists.
That is according to Sinn Féin, following the news that one in four people are waiting for essential treatment.
More than 200,000 people are on lists for therapy services with 60,000 of these waiting over a year for an initial assessment.
Sinn Féin health spokesperson David Cullinane said the Health Minister needs to bring in more staff to deal with the huge backlogs.
Retention and pay issues
Mr Cullinane said: "That illustrates again the need for a workforce planning strategy put in place by the Minister for Health, that ensures we can train more specialists to give us the opportunity to recruit more. But also to look at retention and pay issues, to make sure we can retain many of them [health staff] who unfortunately have left the system over the last number of years."
The Irish Hospital Consultants Association (IHCA) has warned that clearing the backlog of untreated hospital patients could take up to 11 years.
“There has been a 54 per cent increase in people waiting on some form of hospital list since the plan was launched in 2017 — with almost 900,000 adults and children across the country in need of care, things are worryingly moving in the wrong direction,” said IHCA president Professor Alan Irvine.
“The reality is that Sláintecare waiting list targets are not achievable because public hospitals have a severe shortage of consultants, theatres, acute beds, diagnostic and other facilities.”
