A senior medical expert in the Shannonside region believes the government needs to reintroduce Mandatory mask-wearing to 'flatten the curve' of the current wave of Covid.
Fergal Hickey believes that a maximum of eight weeks of mask-wearing would ease the pressure on healthcare settings.
Groups representing doctors and nurses have called for mandatory mask wearing and working from home to be re-introduced.
They say the current spike in Covid cases is putting huge pressure on the health system.
Dr Fergal Hickey is President of the Irish Association for Emergency Medicine and a Consultant in emergency medicine at Sligo University Hospital
He says the mask mandate should be the first option to tackle the current surge in Covid cases
"I would like to see the mask mandate return. I would like to see them going more than this rather anaemic recommendation. I think it is not too much to ask and we're not talking about doing it indefinitely."
"We're talking about doing it for a matter of maybe, 4,6, 8 weeks something like this, so we can flatten the curve."
Earlier today the Health Minister has said no new Covid-19 restrictions have been recommended.
However General Secretary of the Irish Nurses and Midwives Organisation, Phil Ni Sheaghdha says the situation in hospitals is rapidly deteriorating :
There are 34 people at Sligo University hospital today waiting to be admitted - and 36 at Galway university hospital but Mullingar just has five people at its ED today- after several days of escalation warnings.
She says March is going to break all overcrowding records:
"This is the worst March we have ever recorded. the myth that is out there, 'ah shur every March is bad' that's not true. We have 11,000 recorded this month and in the same period in 2020 we had 3150 and in march 2021 we had 4,126."
