Health Concerns: When the authorities decided to downgrade Monaghan General Hospital, and hospitals like it round the country, they were told that their plan would not work, that hospitals to take the extra workload would not be in a position to do so, and that people could die unnecessarily as a result and so it came to pass. Not only did they downgrade hospitals but the remaining hospitals did not have the capacity to deal with the extra call on their services and patients suffered. Some of those, who promoted the downgrading, are still in power and still making decisions for our Health Services. They still do not see that money needs to be spent in providing the people of this country with proper services. Then they try to build the most expensive hospital in the world even though the original cost was only a fraction of what the final bill will be. Even before it was three foot high I was informed by a person in the know that the final figure would be close to €3billion. At the moment we are told that the cost will be over €2billion – how much over no one knows. If we were to consider the extra benefits this extra money could have provided in the Health Services then we might all have benefitted and perhaps Doctors and nurses could have been enticed to stay in Ireland and help provide a workable health service. I am also critical of the location selected for the Hospital as I would find it very difficult to find my way to its location, find a parking bay, and then find my way out of Dublin again. I ask – will the parking place at the hospital be reserved for those attending the hospital or visiting a patient in it or will it be like others - open to all and used by people who work somewhere else in the area? Many of those making decisions re. health services are likely able to pay for a very good health Insurance and so by-pass the waiting list for health services. Almost every day at least one ambulance, with blue lights flashing and siren blaring, goes through Emyvale on its way from Letterkenny to Dublin. It is obvious that a very ill patient is tied down in that ambulance, which is trying its best to get to Dublin as quickly as possible. Any delay is dangerous as time is so important to survival. The Golden Hour is still regarded as vital but authorities will try to convince us that getting to one of these Big Hospitals is more important. I wonder would they agree if they were the patient strapped down in the back of the ambulance from Letterkenny??