The Louth and East Meath Fianna Fáil Comhairle Dáil Cheantair (CDC) has fired their PRO John Kierans following a report published by Drogheda Life yesterday in which he is quoted as saying “Covid 19 no different to a bad flu season”.

The CDC officer board held a special meeting yesterday evening and a number of decisions were taken, one of which was to suspend John Kierans as their PRO with immediate effect.

After the meeting CDC Secretary Venetia Taylor issued a statement on behalf of the Board late last night to Drogheda Life which reads as follows:

“The Fianna Fáil Comhairle Dáil Ceantair, the party’s governing body for Louth and East Meath, wishes to disassociate itself from the statement purportedly issued on its behalf today by John Kierans: "FF spokesperson says Covid 19 no different to a bad flu season". 

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“Mr. Kierans’ statement was not issued with the approval of the Fianna Fáil CDC and the motions referred to in it are not on the Fianna Fáil CDC agenda. They are not representative of the views of the CDC or Fianna Fáil party policy generally.

“The Fianna Fáil CDC does not share and, moreover, rejects any assertion that the Covid-19 pandemic is no worse than a bad flu season. 

“We fully support the government’s approach to combating the spread of the virus and pay tribute to the brave sacrifices being made by our health care professionals and express condolences to the over 3,000 families who have lost a loved one.  

“The Fianna Fáil CDC encourages the public to continue to observe all the measures necessary to eliminate the spread of the Covid 19 virus, and further information on the measures in place to combat the virus is available at https://www.gov.ie/en/publication/2dc71-level-5/  which was last updated on 28th January, 2021.”