Stephen Donnelly (Wicklow, Fianna Fail) | Oireachtas source

The service line is essentially a subset of the national cancer strategy, so any funding we get will be in the context of funding through next year for the national cancer strategy. There is also a separate funding line for the genetics and genomic strategy, which is fairly recent. Specifically on those services for patients with a predisposition to cancer, we have direct ordering of BRCA testing, which was introduced in 2017 for ovarian cancer patients. It was expanded to breast cancer patients in 2021 and to prostate cancer patients in 2023. Last year, some 700 patients were tested, so there has been a very encouraging expansion of the service. I do not have the figures, but we are looking at the time it is taking. Some affected families have told me that they want to see the waiting time greatly reduced.

See this speech in context