Roughly 300 people turned up to the launch of the 'Campaign for a Decent Public Health Service' on the evening of the 11th February in Liberty Hall. The public meeting was organised by the Dublin Council of Trade Unions and the campaign hopes to bring together health workers and their trade unions, patient groups, hospital campaigners, the trade union movement in general and the general public to demand a civilised health service.

The Dublin Council of Trade Unions will be launching their campaign on the health service at a public meeting at 6pm in Liberty Hall on Monday 11th February.

In Ireland we like to think that we’ve long ago abolished the death penalty; that we’ve progressed beyond such primitive practices, that we’re too civilized for that. But Irish people are still being sentenced to death, and not even for crimes they have committed but for the crimes of our murderous health system. Long waiting lists, unhygienic hospitals, downgrading of regional hospitals, are all symptoms of a rotten institution that refuses to reform.

Wage increases were handed to the top-brass while ordinary health workers and the public were faced with cut-backs, lay-offs and recruitment freezes. It's clear that the politicians, the powerful HSE bureaucracy and the hospital consultants will continue to look out for each other while ordinary people suffer.

The 'Miss D' case put in context with the struggle in Ireland for women to have full control over their own bodies and the position taken by the WSM on this issue. A few weeks ago, a 17 year old girl, 4 months pregnant, known as 'Miss D' was brought before the courts to determine whether or not she should be allowed to travel to England for an abortion. The baby she was carrying had been diagnosed with anencephaly, a condition that leads to still-births. The longest an infant has survived outside the womb with this condition is a few days. Yet the Irish government were unwilling to let Miss D have an abortion, denying Miss D's basic human rights under the guise of 'letting the baby die with dignity'.

The greedy consultants are taking advantage of the current crisis in the health system to help line their own pockets. They're not going on strike in solidarity with the nurses' justified industrial action. Instead, they've recognised the opportunity to make the health service unworkable and so increase the pressure on the Health Services Executive (HSE) and the Department of Health to make their new contracts even sweeter and grab some more cash in the process. They're delaying the much needed reforms in the health service and the increases in consultant numbers, that would benefit all of Irish society, for their own selfish reasons.

We all know that the health service is in a terrible state. Elderly patients on trolleys and in chairs for days while they wait for a bed. Operations cancelled, stressed staff, people having to wait years just to see a consultant.

Why? Ireland is now a wealthy country, there is a lot of cash out there. But, as long as the rich and the politicians have their private hospitals, like the Blackrock Clinic and the Bon Secours in Cork, why should they care about what happens to the rest of us?

In January 2005, Michael X, a courier driver, went to see his GP complaining of recurrent diarrhoea and passing some blood. Following an examination, his GP sent a letter to arrange for an appointment with a gastro-enterologist for specialist assessment. His appointment arrived in the post - he could see the consultant in July, six months later.

The nurses’ work-to-rule and their threat to escalate the action next week has been met with an outraged onslaught by Mary Harney and Bertie Ahern. The sight of a group of workers standing up and demanding their rights has become so unusual that it seems as if the government cannot believe the temerity of the nurses in doing just that.

IN THE FRONTLINE:The Minister for Health, Brian Cowen is refusing to appoint the senior consultant paediatrician Mary Mackey. If there is no senior consultant there will be no paediatricians. Bring your sick and injured children elsewhere.