Catherine Byrne (Dublin South Central, Fine Gael) | Oireachtas source

I do not really, as I did not know if I would be coming here. I am not very good when it comes to blood and I am very bad with needles. Talking about blood is not my forte, but two things jump off the page, one of which is the major challenge presented by the decline in blood products in the past few years and the use of red cells and platelets. What is the reason for this? I do not understand what it is about. The other matter concerns the virus in pork. Pork is my favourite dish, but we will not go into that. I was, however, interested in what was said about it.

One thing I know about is blood products and blood donors. I am not a donor because of a previous long-term illness because of which I cannot give blood. I would have liked to do so, but, unfortunately, I had an illness when I was a child. I have just spent two weeks in the children's hospital with my grandson who has been there for a while and I was fascinated by the scenario of young children receiving blood. I was speaking to the parent of a little baby who had such a rare disease that he could only receive blood of a certain type. Are there statistics for the numbers of people in the country with the different blood types? What is the blood type particular medical cases can only receive?