Sir, – The Minister for Health, Jennifer Carroll MacNeill, after a long consultative period, announced a doubling down on Limerick city as the only option for the new badly needed acute hospital for the midwest.To say this has been met dismay here in Clare is an understatement.We had heard a site was being considered beside the motorway near Shannon Airport which would have made complete sense, easy access to the whole midwest via the motorway network, much shorter travel times for emergency patients from west Clare and plenty of space for development on a greenfield site.Instead, a site has been chosen just up the road from the present University Hospital Limerick (UHL), a built-up area with significant traffic build-up and no parking already without adding another large hospital to the mix. A friend of ours in her 90s had a fall outside her house last week, was unable to move and had to spend three hours on the ground as available ambulances were diverted for “emergencies” before then facing an hour-long journey at least from west Clare to UHL.It seems to me the main consideration taken into account for the new hospital was how easy it would be for consultants to pop from hospital to the other and not the general public whom it was meant to serve. – Yours, etc,ENDA SCANLON, Ennis,Co Clare.