Ms Marie O'Shea:

I will answer the second question first, if I can move forward in that way. The pressure I was under in producing this report was due to the fact that I work full time, as the Senator may be aware. It was very much the writing-up of the report which was the pressurising aspect of it. I am quite confident from what I have read, seen and done with regard to the evidence base of this report that if I had spent five years doing this, I would have come up with the same report unless something had dramatically changed in the meantime.

On the remote model of care, I am not aware of the reference the Senator has made to the HSE saying that it has increased the risk of coercive control being exercised on a person's reproductive autonomy. As someone who works in family law, I encounter many people who have been in coercively controlled relationships. As I have said in the report, I believe the remote model of care can work both ways. A person who cannot physically leave the house - who is tracked, trailed and locked in - cannot physically get to a GP. That is a problem. I have spoken to many GPs. As was stated at the START conference, in most cases GPs have adopted a hybrid model of care. They see benefits in seeing the person on one occasion, at least, for public health issues; for example, to see if these persons need to be screened for various sexually transmitted diseases, to talk to them about contraception, to refer them for rhesus D, and to take bloods to see if they are at risk of the rhesus D factor. This is multitudinous but the remote model of care has certainly ameliorated some of the difficulties for people travelling for abortions also.