‘It’s like a third world hospital’: Shane MacGowan’s sister slams University Hospital Limerick

The sister of the late singer, Shane MacGowan, has compared conditions at University Hospital Limerick to that of a “First World War trench camp”.

Siobhan MacGowan was one of hundreds of people who took part in the latest demonstration at the overcrowding crisis at Limerick’s main hospital.

And she recalled her experience when she brought her 94-year-old father Maurice to UHL after he complained of a heart murmur.

“He was on a trolley overnight. Nobody was coming around to him. He has slight dementia.

“I had to stay with him as long as I could. I came back the next morning and had to get him out of here and drive up with him to Dublin to have him seen to,” she told RTE News standing at the gates of UHL.

“It's like a third world hospital, it's like a First World War trench camp. It's bloody awful,” Ms MacGowan added.

The day after the protest, organised by Garryowen man Mike Daly, a new high was reached in terms of the number of patients waiting on trolleys for a bed, 132.

The increase in patients presenting to the emergency department is being blamed on a surge of the winter virus. It led to the cancellation of all non-urgent elective surgery in the Dooradoyle facility.