Dr. Tony Holohan:

I do not want to cut across the Chairman as he is bringing the meeting to a close, but I believe we have not had an opportunity to set out in broad terms some of the things we think are going to happen in the next few days. I would like to give a little more detail of what the Taoiseach was talking about this morning, although in the circumstances, I do not want to spend a long time in describing it. If we call the total 3,000 people for the purposes of discussion, whether they are part of the original 1,482 or the cohort that has to be identified, each case is to be looked at through an international process we are to establish. We have taken steps to begin to mobilise some of that expertise. It will require us to gain access to some of the slide materials from some of the laboratories. It will require us to do the data matching that was described. Any discordance, in the 208 cases we know about or any other one we might identify, will be subject to a full clinical review which will involve assessment by an international panel of experts capable of making it. It will include a review of charts and a meeting with each of the individual patients. Each individual woman who finds herself in this situation will have the question addressed as to the likelihood it has had an impact on either her treatment at the time of diagnosis or the eventual outcome. In very tragic cases where people are no longer alive, for the next of kin who will such information, it will help to address some of the questions for them.

We also see some of the information in the findings of that process which will bring it to one report which will be published being made available to feed into ongoing consideration of the redress process that the Taoiseach this morning indicated that he was open to considering and to which the Government will give consideration. We are also giving further consideration - I know that the Minister has taken steps today to engage with other parties to - to the question as to what will be the most effective investigative vehicle to bring closure to some of the items of information, in particular some of the additional items that came into the public domain last evening. With the Minister amd as the director general said, we will receive receive daily reports from the head of the serious incident management team, SIMT, and Mr. Damien McCallion who will have operational responsibility. We will receive a daily report from the director general on progress in the management of everything that has been described.