In October 2021, Amanda Torrens agreed to sell a business she had spent 20 years building. Over the previous two decades, Torrens had created one of Ireland’s leading nursing-home groups, Brindley Healthcare, recording annual revenues in excess of €24 million. What started out as a single care home in her native Donegal ballooned to 11 operations dotted across the country into counties including Kildare, Mayo, and Galway. Torrens had no intention of selling in the midst of the pandemic. But an offer she never would have dreamed of arrived from Orpea (since renamed Emeis), a French giant that operates over…