A PUBLIC health expert has criticised Tánaiste Leo Varadkar's over his insistence that an all-island 'zero Covid' strategy is impossible due to Northern Ireland's 'free travel' arrangements.
Dr Gabriel Scally said the move towards a dramatic reduction in cases north and south of the border was "entirely possible" but required a "unified response" between Stormont leaders and their counterparts in the Republic.
The Belfast-born medic, who is President of the Epidemiology and Public Health section of the Royal Society of Medicine, was responding to an interview on Monday in which Mr Varadkar outlined his opposition to a recommendation by the south's chief medical officer (CMO) to introduce 'level 5' lockdown restrictions.
The Irish government rejected the proposal - instead moving to level 3 measures - with Mr Varadkar going further by claiming the move hadn't been "thought through" by CMO Dr Tony Holohan and that there had been no prior consultation with government.
Leo Varadkar states on @rte that elimination of Covid-19 in Ireland is impossible because of Northern Ireland. Yet the NI Assembly Health committee support it. An all-island approach is essential to suppress and eliminate the virus. #ZeroCovid pic.twitter.com/jdjY7wNhIu
— Dr Gabriel Scally (@GabrielScally) October 6, 2020
During the RTÉ interview, the tánaiste also stressed they were "not proposing a zero Covid or an all-island strategy" due to Northern Ireland's position.
He said: "They (public health officials) agree with us that's not workable because of the land border with Northern Ireland, because they have free travel with the UK.
"It's not that it's politically unpalatable, it's not politically plausible or possible."
But Dr Scally, who has been a high-profile advocate of all-island strategy to curb the spread of the virus since the outbreak of the pandemic, rejected the 'travel' argument.
"If you are going to travel, you have to be subject to these public health restrictions, whether that's a testing regime or a quarantine regime. That's what the issue is and that's done in other places in the world, such as Australia, where they put quarantines on borders," he said.
The medic also highlighted the backing given to an all-island approach by the Stormont's cross-party health committee.
"The key question for Leo Varadkar is - have you discussed this with your northern counterparts? He is very clearly saying that the thing that makes it impossible is the Northern Ireland approach. That's wrong, it has to be a joint north/south effort and it will succeed," he said.
"But it will only succeed if both parts of the island join together. I think it is unacceptable to put the blame on Northern Ireland. The politicians, north and south, need to sit down together and produce a unified response to the virus.
"The memorandum of cooperation is no longer enough. There has to be an integrated effort."
