Whether there were less people on hospital waiting lists at the end of last year than there were a few months earlier is difficult to establish.
A cursory look at the waiting list figures published by the Department of Health would seem to indicate the numbers waiting are down.
However, looking more closely at the list, it emerges that some hospitals are not on the list at all.
There are no waiting list figures given for St Columcille's Hospital in Loughlinstown, Dublin; Louth County Hospital in Dundalk; or Monaghan General Hospital.
In addition, Tallaght Hospital in Dublin appears to have no day case waiting list even though it has a day ward. A consultant at the hospital recently complained that the unit was being used more and more often as an overflow for the hospital's overcrowded accident and emergency department. The hospital must therefore have a day case waiting list somewhere.
In addition, the waiting lists do not show the numbers of people waiting for outpatient appointments to see a consultant once referred by their GP. Neither do they show the growing numbers who are being referred back to their GP by consultants who can't deal with them because their list is already overloaded.
Moreover, these latest figures, which indicate the shift in numbers waiting for in-patient and day case treatment between September and December last year, do not reflect the effects of recent bed closures at hospitals across the country. When the five Dublin academic teaching hospitals announced earlier this month that they would have to close 250 beds, they indicated they would be treating 14,000 less patients, at a minimum, this year.
The next waiting list figures therefore are unlikely to make happy reading for a Government that promised to abolish waiting lists by the end of next year.
While the Minister for Health, Mr Martin, has said significant progress has been made in reducing the number of "long waiters", it is impossible to check this from the figures published yesterday.
They do not show how long those waiting more than 12 months for treatment have actually been waiting. Anecdotal evidence suggests many could be waiting several years. Certainly the bulk of those treated to date under the National Treatment Purchase Fund had been waiting between two to four years. A small number had been waiting up to eight years.
The national health strategy, launched with much razzmatazz in November 2001, promised no adult would have to wait longer than 12 months, and no child longer than six months, for treatment by the end of 2002. Yesterday's figures indicate 5,209 adults were waiting more than a year and 1,081 children were waiting more than six months for treatment at the end of 2002. This means health strategy targets have already been missed.
Mr Martin insisted yesterday the lists were "going in the right direction" but admitted there were questions over the reliability of the figures.
He also conceded that Fianna Fáil's promise to end waiting lists within two years would not now be met.