Following a lead story in last week's Cork Independent, this newspaper his now learned that women in Cork are being informed they will have to wait until 2010 for mammograms, a year later than was previously thought.

The latest revelations - intrinsically linked to last night's vote of no-confidence in Minister for Health Mary Harney TD - have come in the wake of a story in which one woman told of her agonising wait for an appointment in 2009, having being referred to the South Infirmary Victorian University Hospital by her GP.

Both the Cork Independent and Fine Gael TD Bernard Allen have since been contacted by a number of individuals who claim that they have not been so fortunate in getting an appointment as early as 2009, and were instead informed they would have a further year for the low-dose X-ray which is a critical tool in detecting early signs of breast cancer.

Chairman of the Public Accounts Committee Deputy Allen described these further delays as appalling and vowed to take the issue to the HSE Chief Executive Professor Brendan Drumm, while also reserving some stinging criticism for under-fire Health Minister Mary Harney.

"The Health Minister opening address at the Oireachtas Committee meeting last week where she stressed the importance of 'equity of access to health services' was rubbish and incorrect. I have the proof that people are being told they must wait until 2010 for mammograms. It's evidence of an obvious apartheid within the health system. The facts are clear – if you can pay for it, you can get the service overnight. There is no equity of access."

Just hours before last night's major vote, Green party representative Senator Dan Boyle said that last nights debate and subsequent vote raised a bigger issue of where cancer care services should go from here. He said that it was now time to learn from previous mistakes and that it is now imperative to push forward the development of the Centres of Excellence which would greatly improve cancer care in the region. Fianna Fáil TD Noel O' Flynn also called for improvements in the area of cancer care. " Unless you have a three lock system in place you're courting danger and I would ask the Minister to ensure that this three lock system is put in place in every hospital," he said.

Deputy O' Flynn said that while a lot had been said about the debate he had no doubt that Minister Harney would retain her seat and defended her recent actions. "What the Minister's been trying to do is wrestle with the bureaucracy and the time warp in parts of the health service. In fact I think that the Minister has been more courageous than many other health Ministers in the last 15 years," he said.

Deputy Allen said last nights vote would also show many TD's true colours and he threw the gauntlet down to fellow TD's, particularly Fine Fáil's Noel O'Flynn. "This is going to call the bluff of TD's who have been talking out both sides of their mouth. It's time for the likes of Noel O'Flynn to put his politics where his mouth is. There are many mighty mouse's in their own constituency who become mini-mouse's in the Dáil. They now have the opportunity to stand up and be counted," he concluded.

Comments (0) »

Show/Hide comment form

Name

Email

Title

Comment

Write the displayed characters

Add Comment