Sir, – I read the article (“Ireland has 50% more nurses than OECD average”, Health + Family, June 4th) with some scepticism. Sure enough, on further investigation of the actual OECD publication (www.oecd.org/ireland), the following reference was added:
“It is important to note however that the comparability of data on nurses is more limited due to the inclusion of different categories of nurses and midwives in the data reported by different countries.”
In other words, different countries may count registered nurses, midwives, auxiliary nurses, etc, as separate entities.
It can only be in the public’s interest to further investigate and then relate the true statistics, or the cynical part of me will have to view this as a further example of disseminating untruths about nursing and by extension the health service as a whole. – Yours, etc,
SHEILA McEVOY, RN,
4th Avenue S,
Kirkland, Seattle,
Washington,
US.