Mr. Tony O'Brien:

At no point in time did the State Claims Agency seek a confidentiality agreement on this matter. It has been very clear that this was not something it was involved in. It is important as a matter of public confidence.

Has public confidence been shaken? Yes, of course it has. That is the most tragic thing in this circumstance because, unless the CervicalCheck programme continues to receive the active participation and support of the 80% of those eligible who have supported it up to now, we will be in danger of seeing a reversal in the trend for cervical cancer.

I have explained — some people have taken issue with my explanation — that what is at the heart of why we are here now is that a decision to carry out reviews or audits and then to communicate the results to the individuals concerned fell apart at the implementation stage. That is kind of what brings us to where we are now. As Dr. McKenna has outlined, even in extremisbased on the estimates we have heard and even if all of the cases were missed opportunities for diagnosis, they fall, in total, within the parameters of a successful screening programme because screening programmes are not 100% effective. The benefit of this screening programme is that 50,000 women have had a diagnosis of high-grade cell changes resulting in early treatment, resulting in their being able to avoid developing cancer. Consequently, the numbers of cancers have fallen and the number of deaths has fallen. These are really important health benefits in respect of which we must collectively try to do our best not to lose because it would be to the detriment of everyone if the trend went backwards. In addition to putting matters to right for the women who were not given the information they should have been given, one of our greatest focuses and one that has been our immediate priority is restoring public confidence. Without it, we will pay a huge public health price. That is why I am focusing on this now to the extent that I am and why I have taken the steps with the movement of Mr. Damien McCallion to take personal charge of the national cancer screening service.

I ask Mr. Patrick Lynch to speak about how alarm bells should be treated.