Cardiac patients, diabetics and cancer sufferers across Meath will be among those most severely impacted by proposed cuts in agency staff in the Louth-Meath Hospital Group, according to an internal HSE document.

The HSE memo, seen by the Meath Chronicle, has identified 36 separate areas where cuts would result in the highest possible level of danger to patients.

Health campaigners have warned the cuts will have appalling consequences for Meath patients with services dramatically reduced at Our Lady's Hospital in Navan and crucial services curtailed in Our Lady of Lourdes Hospital, Drogheda.

Clinicians have warned that lives will be lost in the wake of proposals to cut all agency staff in the Louth-Meath Hospital Group by December.

Last week, all department head and lead clinicians in the group were told they must cut out all agency staff by 1st December. The cuts must begin by 1st September.

This week, an internal HSE document on the risk implications of a 50 per cent cut in agency staff warned that the move would result in a 75 per cent reduction in elective surgery, the closure of 20 hospital beds in Drogheda, and the transfer of sick children to other facilities.

It also states that there would be a significant impact on chemotherapy and cancer care, as well as delayed admissions and discharges from the emergency departments (EDs).

To read the full story see this week's Meath Chronicle.