Some Northern Ireland ambulances were unable to rush to Creeslough, Co Donegal, after last year’s gas explosion that killed 10 people because the foreign-born paramedics on board did not have visas to cross the border, it has emerged.
The revelation about ambulances based at Altnagelvin Hospital in Derry was made during a British-Irish Parliamentary Assembly inquiry into the operation of the century-old Common Travel Area agreement between the Republic and the UK.
“Some ambulances from Northern Ireland were unable to assist at the Creeslough explosion because not all paramedics had the necessary visas to cross the invisible border,” Fine Gael Senator Emer Currie told the Assembly.
However, Northern Ireland’s emergency services played a significant role in the aftermath of the Creeslough tragedy in October 2002, including crews from the NI Fire and Rescue Service, the air ambulance and the ambulance service.
Nevertheless, the example of Creeslough has been used to highlight the difficulties that registration and visa rules create for health services in the Republic and Northern Ireland, particularly for hospital consultants who treat patients on both sides of the border.
Meanwhile, cross-border registration rules for health professionals were causing difficulties in social care, the committee, led by Senator Currie, told the Assembly, which adopted its report and list of recommendations.
Northern Ireland’s Western Health and Social Care Trust, which runs hospitals in Derry, Fermanagh and Tyrone, has eight children receiving social care in the Republic at any one time. This requires up to 30 staff to be registered with Coru, the Republic’s child psychology service, for each case, placing “an additional administrative and financial burden” on the trust, the committee found.
Meanwhile, divergent visa rules between the Republic and the UK are causing problems for immigrants who have the legal right to live in one jurisdiction but not the right to travel between the two – including for medical treatment.
Cancer and paediatric cardiology services are provided on an all-Ireland basis, while the Irish government has funded cross-border cancer treatment in the North West: “However, not everyone has access to these services,” the Assembly heard.
Differences in immigration and residency rules also pose challenges in education, with some foreign-born children unable to join school trips or travel from Donegal through Northern Ireland to colleges in Dublin.
