It's an historic day for University College Cork today where UCC's final year medical graduates will be conferred online.
It's the first online conferring in the 175 year history of the the university, and UCC President of UCC, Professor Patrick O’Shea says it's a tribute to the the courage of Ireland’s frontline medical community and the resilience of the UCC students who have joined them.
The Taoiseach, Leo Varadkar, will address the graduates in a special video message later today.
The graduation of the UCC medical graduates has been brought forward to assist the health service during the Covid-19 pandemic.
Speaking to RedFM News graduating final year UCC Medicine Student Patrick Hogan says it's been all shoulders to the wheel to make this happen but it's worth it to join the fight against the COVID19 outbreak.
"We've kind of been joking about that - we'll always be the Covid class!
"When you're a final med student, and towards the end of year you hear the horror stories of the final year med exams and how traumatic they are and how hard they are, we'll say 'oh yeah, we had our exams in three days and they were seven weeks earlier than they should have been!'
"It's not just a moment for us, it is a moment for everyone, and I'm hoping that it will be maybe a breath of fresh air into the workforce, give people a little bit of an uplift, things are happening we will get through this."
