Behind Closed Doors
Why did the management of St. Luke’s General Hospital, Kilkenny bring in such draconian visiting restrictions in early August 2023? - see my post titled “1997”.
Why have those draconian visiting restrictions never been lifted although, on 3rd August 2023 Professor Garry Courtney, Clinical Director of St. Luke’s General Hospital, Kilkenny went on KCLR 96FM (Kilkenny Carlow Local Radio) and announced the draconian measures and that they would only last for a week or two, maybe three?
Following our father’s death in early 2023 at St. Luke’s General Hospital, Kilkenny our family wrote a number of serious complaint letters to the management of the hospital including Professor Garry Courtney to ask why a System Analysis Investigation into our father’s death at that hospital had not been carried out. Our complains were never answered appropriately.
Therefore, on 1st August 2023 our family wrote once again by email to the HSE via Niamh Lacey, General Manager of St. Luke’s General Hospital, Kilkenny with a copy to Professor Garry Courtney, Clinical Director of St. Luke’s General Hospital, Kilkenny. However, this time we also copied in Dr Philip Crowley, National Director of Strategy and Research, HSE Head Office and the HSE Communication Department at Ireland East Hospital Group, One Kilmainham Square, Dublin.
Our family’s email dated 1st August 2023 contained an email trail sent by us on 13th July 2023 to Niamh Lacey, General Manager of St. Luke’s General Hospital, Kilkenny and Professor Garry Courtney, Clinical Director of that hospital where we described shocking details of how staff of the hospital mistreated our father and how our family witnessed what happened over the whole period of his second admission to that hospital. This was the first time Dr Philip Crowley, National Director of Strategy and Research, HSE Head Office and the HSE Communication Department was made aware of that correspondence.
Suddenly, two days later on 3rd August 2023 the hospital is in “lockdown” and Prof Garry Courtney, Clinical Director of St. Luke’s General Hospital, Kilkenny takes part in a propaganda broadcast on the local radio station KCLR 96FM (Kilkenny Carlow Local Radio) spewing nonsense about “Covid” in order to frighten people and make sure they are too scared to go near the hospital and telling visitors they can only attend by “appointment” in exceptional cases.
It is my strongly held opinion that receipt of our family’s email communication dated 1st August 2023 by Dr Philip Crowley, National Director of Strategy and Research, HSE Head Office and the HSE Communications Department started the chain of events which happened next and this was done in order to prevent families from seeing how their loved ones are being mistreated at that hospital.
This is evidence of the far-reaching length the Health Service Executive (HSE) will go to continue to try to pull the wool over people’s eyes about “Covid” - see my post titled: “PCR – (Polymerase Chain Reaction)”.
What exactly does Professor Garry Courtney mean by continually referring to “Covid”. The PCR test kit the hospital uses only tests for SARS-CoV-2 the virus and not Covid-19 the disease. Does Professor Garry Courtney actually know this?
Rather “Covid” in my opinion is being used as a cover story for the Health Safety Executive’s (HSE) failure, the hospital’s poor management, its lack of appropriately trained staff and an attempt to not be found out in all the lies they have been telling the public since 2020.
How many elderly people in the Carlow and Kilkenny area were sitting alone in their homes listening to and believing this propaganda broadcast on KCLR 96FM, causing them fear and distress?
Will Professor Garry Courtney be held to account for causing fear and distress to the sick and the elderly and their families?
Listen to how many times Professor Garry Courtney contradicts himself in the broadcast. He does have some level of academic intelligence as can be seen from his job title of professor and therefore, in my opinion knows that he is misleading the public with his spewed nonsense which can only be described as evil.
Every patient of that hospital is entitled to an advocate. However, these restrictive measures prevent that and lead to worst outcomes for patients. This abuse of our sick and elderly patients has to stop, they need their family to be present and to advocate for them.
People need to find out what exactly is going on at St. Luke’s General Hospital, Kilkenny behind closed doors!
KCLR 96FM (Kilkenny Carlow Local Radio) broadcast 3rd August 2023 under the following heading:
“On Thursday (3rd August 2023) St. Luke’s General Hospital for Carlow and Kilkenny announced a temporary visitor ban as Covid Cases rise again. Our Edwina Grace has been speaking with Clinical Director Professor Garry Courtney”
See following link for the seven-minute propaganda broadcast:
Full Transcript:
Edwina Grace states: “Clinical Director at St. Luke’s General Hospital for Carlow and Kilkenny Professor Garry Courtney mmm it’s been another very busy time I suppose for you Garry and your team and you’ve had to put in specific measures in the last 24 hours”.
Professor Garry Courtney responds: “Thanks Edwina, yes it’s very difficult here for the past couple of days, we’ve really caught up in a big outbreak of Covid which I know a lot of people thought was behind us but Covid has never gone away and it has now burst out again. We have at the moment 32 infected patients over five wards. So that’s a major outbreak and we expect the numbers to continue to rise for the next few days at least. We have obviously put control measures in place but that…anybody that has been infected will develop symptoms in the next few days so we are probably going to hit 40, 45 which by the way was the highest number we had back in the old Covid days. So, to, to deal with this unfortunately we have to put visiting restrictions in place again mmm they’re across the board. We really want people to keep away from the hospital because they could be carrying Covid and the hospital is full of Covid. So what I would say is obviously for maternity unit we…visiting will be allowed cos this is a really emotional time but people will have to wear masks and PPE and obviously in any other part of the hospital there will be exemptions made for exceptional cases so the Childrens’ ward for instance or somebody who is very ill or “end of life care” and what we’ll do is we can phone mmm the relatives of patients who are in those categories and offer them appointments where they can come in for half an hour wearing masks and PPE and we’ll give them those times that they will be able to be with their loved ones. But we really do have to clamp down on visiting that isn’t strictly necessary.”
Edwina Grace states: “We have put full details up on the KLRC website if anyone wants to check out what is and isn’t allowed, its KCLR97FM.com but Professor Courtney how concerned are you about the current wave of Covid?”
Professor Garry Courtney responds: “Oh we are very concerned because it’s very infectious as you know, we don’t think this is a new variant but we’re working on that, a number not just us a number of hospitals have been affected, Kerry Hospital is very affected, Galway University Hospital is very affected and others and were…it spreads really quickly. It’s not that obvious and you know, sniffles, its runny nose, its sore throat, it’s a cough, breathlessness. You know all the thing about the loss of taste and smell, but there’s a new thing we see now which is diarrhea and a lot of the patients that we have are very elderly, they are very infirm and are having a lot of diarrhea and that puts a lot of strain on the nurses and healthcare attendants who are looking after them because they…no sooner have they cleared up one patient who has been very unwell with diarrhea, there’s another one and then there’s another one. So, the staff are under a lot of pressure and some staff are infected and have to be gone, so we are being caught everyway, more patients coming in, older, sicker, more frail, staff getting ill and already as you know…we’re probably…you probably know we have a lot of staff shortages at the moment. So that’s why we have to actually say regrettably that for a week or two maybe three we’re going to have quite strict visiting restrictions, except for the exemptions that you’ve kindly put up on your website and I’d encourage everybody to go and look at your…the KCLR website 97FM, get it, look at it and if you have any difficulties with that phone and the hospital be able to answer any questions.”
Edwina Grace states: “And what is it do you think Professor Courtney, have we forgotten the basics all over again, the proper washing of hands and you know mmm keeping a respectful distance from people or?”
Professor Garry Courtney responds: “Yes that’s, that’s, it’s as simple as that mmm Covid never went away okay we’ve, we have never had a day that we didn’t have Covid here, so that last few weeks I suppose it was five patients, six patients, seven you know these kinds of numbers up and down, but it never went away and suddenly it has just burst out. Edwina have you been out shopping recently?” How many people did you see wearing masks? How many people did you see in close gatherings? So, everybody’s forgotten that we were fed up to the teeth of this and people just went back to normal living and that’s I suppose what we all wanted but unfortunately mmm I think mmm it’s just my opinion that it’ll still take possibly a year to two for Covid to work its way through the system. So, we’re going to get flare ups like this and you know we’ll have to deal with them and we’ll just get used to dealing with them like the flu but, it’s still a bit more infectious than the flu. We don’t see this with the flu. When the flu comes into our hospital, we don’t see thirty, forty patients’ being infected in the hospital. So, this is a highly infectious virus but fortunately patients are ill but there not dying, so that is different, it’s a…the variant is less virulent, it’s killing less people, but it is making them quite sick and the older they are of course the sicker they get.”
Edwina Grace states: “And I suppose to that end then mmm Professor Courtney this not only affects mmm people who are looking to visit somebody who’s currently in St. Luke’s General Hospital for Carlow and Kilkenny but also those who might present at the emergency department locally to, I know you guys are suggesting that they look at alternative mmm care routes as well.”
Professor Garry Courtney responds: “If you’ve got a…exactly and if you have a cough, sneezes, breathlessness not too bad, sore throat, you know mild headache, take two Panadol, plenty of mmm fluids, go to bed, keep away from other people. If you are getting worst, obviously and you feel you have to come into hospital, the hospital is always there, we will always be here. But if we just get people coming into an emergency department with, you know what really is mmm you know if you are young and healthy a minor illness, Covid is a minor illness that should be self-treated at home mmm don’t go in like that to your GP surgery because that’s just going to spread it. Now you can phone your GP or you can get advice on the phone or you can just mmm you can if you want you can phone the hospital for advice but the answer is if you are not that well mmm not that unwell and you’re young and you just have a mild headache, a sore throat, bit of a hoarse voice, sniffles, runny nose, perhaps a little diarrhea that’s you don’t need to come into hospital for that and you don’t want to be in this hospital because this hospital is now everybody wearing masks, everybody locking down so we’re going into a sort of internal lockdown for a few weeks to try to snuff it out inside the hospital. You see it’s in here now, it’s in the air, its … and the other problem is as you probably know there is a big building programme going on in the hospital and because of that we’ve to close windows because of another infectious risk when we’re digging soil called aspergillosis, it’s just a bit of a double whammy at the moment and if the public could help us out and only visit the hospital if needed that would be a great help to the staff here.”
Edwina Grace states: “Professor Garry Courtney thank you very much for joining us.”
Professor Garry Courtney responds: “Thank you Edwina”.