Taoiseach Micheál Martin only found out when he was texted an Irish Times story that the contact tracing system was so overwhelmed at the weekend that people who tested positive were being asked to do their own contact tracing. Social Democrats TD Catherine Murphy said it’s “not good enough” that people were being asked to do “DIY contact tracing”, and said she was shocked Mr Martin found out by text. He said “it took an awful lot of journalistic action” to find out that it takes over four days to trace close contacts of infected persons. Mr Kelly also questioned the recruitment process for contact tracing and said there were thousands of eligible people including retired civil servants who could be employed. Mr Martin said there was “no secret” being kept on the issue, with every person being informed about contact tracing by text.

Source: The Irish Times October 21, 2020 12:32 UTC