The Irish Nurses and Midwives Organisation has said it is a "mistake" for the Government not to include a nursing or midwifery representative on the new Covid-19 advisory body.
"The total exclusion of the voice of the largest group of health professionals is a mistake," said INMO Deputy General Secretary Edward Mathews.
The Department of Health announced the members of the new body yesterday evening. It will replace the now-defunct National Public Health Emergency Team (NPHET).
Mr Mathews said: "It is particularly disappointing that there is no nursing or midwifery representative on the new Covid-19 Advisory Group.
"Nurses have been sounding the alarm for months now of what exactly it is like to work in overcrowded hospitals while dealing with a highly transmissible virus.
"Excluding nursing and midwifery from a panel that will advise Government going forward shows a distant and unrealistic approach to the pandemic which actually ignores the reality of the situation in the health services."
Mr Mathews added: "Theoretical, research, and on-the-ground perspectives are essential and underrepresented in the membership of this new body - and will ensure a particular, but not particularly accurate picture as time moves forward."
In response to the INMO criticism, Minister of State Colm Brophy said the new group was "a well constituted board as it stands".
Speaking on Saturday with Katie Hannon, the Fine Gael TD said: "This is [a] slimmed down version of what NPHET was. It's going to have additional inputs that weren't on the original NPHET.
"I know that every organisation would believe that they should be there and involved in it, but it’s really important that the voice of our nurses are heard and the comments that they regularly contribute are really important, but within the context of this particular group, this isn’t NPHET and it is a well constituted board as it stands."
Speaking on the same programme, the co-leader of the Social Democrats Róisín Shortall said: "There is a real issue with the lack of gender balance as there was with the full NPHET.
"Nurses were absolutely central to the response to Covid and should of course be represented."
Meanwhile, the number of people with Covid-19 in hospitals has decreased by over 100 in the last 24 hours.
This morning, there were 1,069 people in hospital who had tested positive for the virus, compared to 1,182 yesterday.
There are also fewer patients with Covid in intensive care, down to 52 today from 58 yesterday.
There were 5,883 new Covid-19 infections confirmed by the Department of Health yesterday.
These include 2,845 PCR-confirmed cases and 3,038 positive antigen tests notified on the HSE portal.
This is down 45% compared to the 10,839 positive cases reported a week previously.
