Hopkins urges new Health Minister to expedite plans to put air ambulance on a permanent footing

Fine Gael candidate for the Roscommon/South Leitrim bye-election, Cllr Maura Hopkins, has urged new Health Minister Leo Varadkar to expedite plans to put the pilot air ambulance service on a permanent footing.

“The Government has already provisionally confirmed that this life-saving service will be retained on a permanent basis. However, following my representations to the Department of Health this week, I have been informed that the Department of Defence has agreed to extend this Emergency Aeromedical Service (EAS) service until December next pending the finalisation of a report being carried out by a special review group.

“This group has been tasked to look at a range of options in relation to the operation of the service, including the development of an additional cross-border service to extend the scope of the EAS.

“I am meeting Minister Varadkar this week and will be impressing upon him the need to put the air ambulance service on a permanent footing as soon as possible.

“The Department of Health also confirmed to me this week that the EAS helicopter has carried out almost 140 life-saving missions in total across Roscommon and Leitrim since its launch in the summer of 2012. The Roscommon and Leitrim figures, 113 and 26 cases respectively, represent 20% of the total number of successful missions to date, which now stands at 730.

“Significantly, 30% of the total missions (226) were serious heart attack cases which needed to be transported to a specialist centre within 90 minutes of diagnosis to ensure the best outcome. Usually, air ambulance flight times to these specialist centres takes little more than twenty minutes to complete.

“Clearly, the service, operating from its base at Custume Barracks, Athlone, has been a tremendous success in Roscommon and Leitrim since its inception and I will be doing everything I can to ensure the EAS will be made permanent as soon as possible.”