Hospital meeting cancelled at last minute

A crucial meeting of Meath's TDs with Health Minister, Stephen Donnelly on the future of Navan Hospital was cancelled at the last minute tonight.

The meeting, which was due to take place at 5pm was cancelled at 5.05pm when those who had logged onto the online meeting were told the Minister and local govrnment TDs had been called away urgently.

The local TDs had been planning to demand assurances on the future of Navan hospital, according to Deputy Johnny Guirke who confirmed the meeting had been called off.

Top of the agenda was a demand for assurances on the future of the A&E and Intensive Care unit at Our Lady's Hospital

This follows the protest two weeks ago when nearly 10,000 took to the streets of Navan to oppose HSE plans to downgrade Navan A&E and ICU units and replacing them with a Medical Assessment Unit and a Local Injuries Unit.

On a visit to Navan on Monday, Taoiseach Micheal Martin said they were not closing anything.

He said the hospital in Navan was part of a wider set of hospitals and services needed to reflect changing population and demographics.

"We're not closing anything. We're expanding services. We take the medical advice, we take the clinical advice in respect of the optimal configuration of hospitals, but the Northeast is growing and demographically it's growing and the health services will grow in this area to reflect that."