Surgeon says cutbacks could cost children's lives
A consultant surgeon has warned that children will die because of the closure of operating theatres.
Michael O'Keefe, a Consultant Ophthalmologist at Temple Street Children's Hospital, said he is speaking out because others in the health service are afraid to.
He said consultants have been ordered to cut back by one third the amount of work they are doing in order to keep within budget.
Although classed as elective procedures, Professor O'Keefe said many of the operations in question are in fact "quasi emergencies", and he warned that lives will be lost as a result.
"If you have to tell a parent that a child has cataracts - and cataracts in young children are quite different to adult cataracts - if you have to delay these (procedures) you have to tell them that that prognosis for getting good vision is less," he said.
"If you've got glaucoma they could go blind, if you've got a tumour and it goes outside the eye it could kill the child.
"It's as simple as that - it could kill the child, no matter what you do."
