Details of which regions will be worst hit by the Health Service Executive's plans to cut 600 jobs this year have been announced.
Most of the jobs will be shed in the eastern, southern and western regions but the executive insisted the cuts would be met through what it called "natural wastage and non-filling of vacancies".
It said the cuts were made possible by the amalgamation of 11 health boards into a unified health structure. The cuts would apply to "administration and backroom functions", the executive added. In a statement it insisted: "These reductions will not affect frontline services to patients nor will they apply to new posts being created by the HSE in 2005 under the A&E and the intellectual disability development plans.
"The reduction in posts shall focus on those areas where opportunities arise for the co-ordination of services and where the economies of scale of the new national structure allow for such reductions." These areas will include administration, finance, population health, health promotion and maintenance.
Some 159 jobs will be cut in the eastern region, 153 in the west, 135 in the south and 76.5 in both the Dublin/Midlands and Dublin North East regions.
The HSE's plans to cut these 600 jobs, to comply with Government employment ceilings, were revealed last April in its annual service plan. At the time the move angered health-sector unions, who complained they had not been consulted and that the plan could affect patient care. However, there was a high-level meeting between the unions and employers last month and details of where the cuts would be made were outlined. Unions were assured that while there would be some cuts, services would also be expanded in a number of areas and more hospital beds would be opened this year.
Labour health spokeswoman Liz McManus has sought a guarantee that frontline health services will not be affected by the job cuts.
She said that while the executive claimed new jobs in vital services such as A&E would not be affected, such a large-scale round of redundancies would "undoubtedly have a knock-on effect on frontline services".