Significant bed closures are expected to be announced within days by the five main Dublin teaching hospitals.
It is understood the closures will be in addition to the 115 announced by the Mater Hospital in March.
The move will put further pressure on the Minister for Health, Mr Martin, who has been strongly criticised for the manner in which he initially handled the threat of SARS.
The Dublin Academic Teaching Hospitals affected will include Beaumont, Tallaght, St Vincent's, St James's and the Mater. Together they face a €100 million deficit this year.
"To say there will be significant bed closures is not overstating it," a source close to the hospitals said last night.
"What is unfolding in the Mater is not unique," the source added.
Other measures being considered to allow the hospitals remain within budget include putting off purchasing equipment.
The closures would have a significant impact on Accident & Emergency departments which are already under pressure, often having to accommodate patients on chairs and trolleys for several hours before beds become available.
Conditions in Dublin's hospitals were the subject of controversy earlier this week when it emerged that a 69-year-old Dublin man who died of Legionnaires' Disease was left sitting in a chair in the casualty unit of Tallaght Hospital for eight hours and then spent a further 19 hours on a trolley in casualty before a bed was found for him.
He was later diagnosed with the disease.
The Eastern Regional Health Authority (ERHA), which funds the hospitals, has already said Dublin hospitals treated 15,000 more patients last year than they were funded for.
With funding for this year only slightly up on what was originally planned for 2002, thousands fewer patients will be treated in the Dublin Academic Teaching Hospitals in 2003.
Negotiations between the hospitals and the ERHA on the services which it will fund this year are almost complete, and a joint statement is expected to be issued within the next few days by the teaching hospitals on the measures they will have to take to stay within their budgets.
When their spokesman was contacted last night, he said the hospitals were identifying levels of services they would be able to provide with the resources available to them.
"There will be no compromising the quality of service to patients who are admitted for treatment," he said.