Laois County Council is to write to the Minister for Health after Ireland opted not to recognise ‘long Covid’ as an occupational illness.
The matter was raised by Cathaoirleach of Laois County Council, Barry Walsh, at the November monthly meeting.
The Fine Gael Councillor asked that this decision be reviewed and said that Ireland was an outlier as 24 EU Member States have already recognised long Covid.
Cllr Walsh said: “I’ve been approached by a local group of people who are currently suffering with long COVID who were on the front line working in care settings during the COVID pandemic.
“All of the group contracted COVID and they’re now consequently all suffering still with the long COVID which includes symptoms such as loss of memory, shortness of breath, nausea, headaches to name just a few. A special scheme was put in place to financially support those with long COVID.
“This scheme has had a number of extensions but is due to end on the 31st of December 2025. Anyone still on this scheme has to transfer to the public service sick leave scheme.
“The sick leave scheme provides full pay for only three months followed by half pay for three months.
“After a recent labour court decision Ireland does not recognise long COVID as an occupation illness. 24 EU countries as per the motion have already today formally recognised it as the occupation illness or workplace accident.
“As it stands, the best that all 159 affected people can be offered is a disability payment which is significantly less than their previous salaries.
“A lot of this group have mortgages to pay and this situation is causing undue stress and will have huge financial implications going forward.
“The ICTU has expressed its deep disappointment at the government’s refusal to formally recognise COVID-19 as an occupation illness.
“Care workers were promised they would not be left out of pocket if they contracted COVID while caring for our population and were declared as heroes during the pandemic.
“This group now feel let down and are not getting the promised response.
“I’m calling on the government to review the situation with immediate urgency and look after this group of people.
“So I’ve also contacted Deputy Aird, our colleague, as well to contact the government and I keep getting back a generic response saying that the labour court made this decision but I’m looking for a review of that decision.
“It’s really important. I’ve spoken to a good few of them and they’re really down.
“This is really getting to them and it feels like, you know, they went and looked after people during the COVID pandemic with promises that they wouldn’t be out of pocket and now they’re in a situation where they will be.
“So I just really feel very strongly about this. Some of these people are really suffering mentally with this decision and not being backed up by our government so I want this reviewed and not just the same generic response coming back again.”
Cllr Walsh received cross-party support for this with Independents Caroline Dwane-Stanley, Aisling Moran, Tommy Mulligan and Ollie Clooney all backing him as well as Fianna Fail’s John Joe Fennelly and Padraig Fleming plus Fine Gael’s Paddy Buggy.
Cllr Dwane-Stanley said: “I know a group of people that suffer with this condition and it’s sad to say that these individuals that I know that are affected were actually frontline staff.
“They stepped up to the mark to help the whole country, to help our community at a time of need when COVID hit us and nobody knew what was going to come from it.
“They were the ones that were the frontline staff in our hospitals, mainly looking after people and sadly they have ended up with ill health out of it themselves and some of them have been left physically in a situation where they probably will never go back to work.
“This has to be reviewed and I know that our own Deputy Brian Stanley is very aware of it as well and I have no doubt that this will be raised in the Dail coming up because the scheme is coming to an end on the 31st of December but these people shouldn’t even have to go to the rounds that they’re going to.
“The rest of the EU countries are recognising those who have been affected by COVID and there’s no reason why our country can’t do the same and make a small gesture towards the people who put their lives at risk to protect us.”
Cllr Mulligan said: “I have two friends that I know that have long COVID so I completely understand their suffering and the worries they have as this scheme comes to an end.”
Cllr Moran said: “All of the people that I know that have long COVID all were frontline staff.
“Every person I know that had it and there’s a couple of cases where they had received pay, their pay, whilst they were out sick.
“Some of them had allergies and were still forced to take the vaccine and after taking the vaccine then had ended up with long COVID.
“They were paid for the time as you would imagine they would be and then received a letter to say actually we overpaid you, we weren’t meant to be paying you so can you pay us back X amount of money, adding more stress on them.”
Cllr Buggy said: “We had so many heroes during COVID, frontline staff whether it was nurses, doctors, teenagers working in supermarkets and things like that to get the whole show on the road and it’s very disappointing to think that those who have developed long COVID are now going to be penalised as a result of putting their lives on the line for the rest of us in the nation.”
