Opinion

RQIA debacle will shake public confidence

For the entire board of a vital healthcare watchdog to resign during an unprecedented health emergency indicates that something has gone badly wrong in our oversight system.

The Regulation and Quality Improvement Authority (RQIA) is responsible for inspecting health and social care services, a crucial monitoring role that encompasses the care home sector which, as we know, has experienced significant issues during the coronavirus crisis.

It emerged on Monday evening that all nine members of the RQIA board had quit, saying they were not consulted over key decisions taken during the pandemic, including a move to reduce the frequency of inspections in care homes.

Health minister Robin Swann yesterday defended decisions by his department which were taken in 'the teeth of a full-scale pandemic'.

He added that similar steps were taken by England, Scotland, Wales and the Republic.

There is no doubt that the authorities were dealing at that time with incredibly difficult circumstances with predictions of large-scale loss of life if measures were not taken to suppress the virus.

To that end, there was a major reconfiguration of hospitals which, in conjunction with lockdown and social distancing, helped to prevent the health service being overwhelmed.

However, less successful was the strategy to safeguard the care sector where there were early problems over the availability of personal protective equipment and concerns over patients being discharged from hospital into residential homes.

According to the most recent Nisra figures, 412 care home residents have died, which represents 51 per cent of all Covid-19 deaths in Northern Ireland.

This death toll is a serious source of concern which must be subjected to a rigorous examination to determine if more could have been done to protect lives.

Families place a huge amount of trust in bodies such as the RQIA, to ensure that care homes are run to the highest standards and the safety of elderly and frail residents is of paramount concern.

Whatever the background to the discord that led to the mass resignation of the RQIA board, the public needs to have confidence that oversight structures are doing their job on behalf of patients and residents.

Mr Swann has announced an independent review into this debacle. He could do nothing less but he needs to ensure the findings are made public and lessons learned.