The high cost of healthy foods and gym memberships are also creating barriers to living a healthy lifestyle, according to the research.

Bernard Gloster acknowledged a “significant challenge” in tackling the crisis, with more than 15,000 children with serious disabilities waiting to access their legal right to assessments.

The surgically implanted devices, which are also known as penile prostheses, can be manually inflated to simulate an erection

The call came as Esther Flynn’s grieving husband settled a High Court action against the HSE over her death three years ago.

Mr Gloster has served as chief executive of the HSE since March 2023, having been appointed to the role in December 2022.

At Ennis District Court, Judge Alec Gabbett made his comment after a Shannon-based sunbed business, Solcraft Ltd, entered a guilty plea to selling the use of a sunbed at a sunbed premises, Cosmopoli Tan in Shannon to a person under the age of 18.

In response to the unions' release, the HSE said that Bernard Gloster has asked the HSE's National Employee Relations Service to request the Work Relations Commission to intervene in the threatened industrial action.

Liam Moran had sued the HSE claiming that there was a failure to diagnose that he was suffering from or likely to be suffering from renal cancer in a proper and timely manner.

In a statement on Sunday night, the health authority said most services will continue to operate as normal

Concern has been expressed about a rise in admissions in Ireland, with 869 in hospital with flu on Sunday compared to 530 a week previously.

Cavan General Hospital, in a letter read to the High Court, apologised for “the shortcomings in the care” of mother of four Mary Mulligan who it was claimed was not seen for six hours by an Emergency Department doctor

Lawyers for the HSE told the High Court that the woman, who is in her 70s, was not coping living alone in her rural home since her husband died.

The current ceilings and caps on recruitment were very restrictive, Phil Ní Sheaghdha told RTÉ radio’s Morning Ireland. “The process of recruitment has become increasingly more difficult.”

The Irish Prison Service said it is working closely with the HSE and has secured extra naloxone kits