Alan Kelly (Tipperary, Labour) | Oireachtas source

I thank the Chairman for dealing with this issue in public session because it is a very serious and worrying situation. Ms Healy has provided us with all the correspondence.

I have spoken to Claire Healy a number of times. She got this letter, on 22 July, stating that she was not entitled to be referred to a colposcopist because she went through CervicalCheck but she decided to get her smear done privately. As a result, a letter was issued on 11 June by Dr. Lorraine Doherty, which stated that anyone who went and had smears done privately could not be dealt with. In fairness to Dr. Nóirín Russell of University Hospital Kerry, whom I compliment, she outlined to Claire in a response letter that the letter of 11 June from Dr. Doherty had made this decision - we have a copy of that here as well. Subsequently, after a number of us raised issues with this, it was pointed out that there was a email from Mr. Liam Woods on 16 August changing this. As the Senator stated beforehand, there were emails issued to more than just Kerry hospital. This was across the board, as we know now.

What is deeply worrying is that we have a new director of CervicalCheck who was in here not so long ago and gave information here with which I need to join up the dots. Ms Healy is saying in her letter to us that what was said in here is contrary to her experience. Ms Healy is saying that there was a direction given by the witness, who was here at the time, on 1 June 2019 that she could not be part of CervicalCheck. There was a bit of flurrying around the edges about the fact that screening is not diagnostics. We all know screening is not diagnostic etc. This is not about that. This is about colposcopists and referral. Ms Healy's slides showed that there was an issue that needed to be investigated. Subsequently, after going to the colposcopist and eventually getting it done, it showed that she had a high-grade change which was just below cancerous and it was something to be very concerned about. I have a serious concern here - Ms Healy had high-grade changes - given everything that has gone on in relation to CervicalCheck, that somebody could unilaterally send out a directive such as this. There have obviously been more people affected than the two women we know about and have referred to. Anyone who was in a similar situation would have got the same treatment based on the letter sent in June by Dr. Doherty. I am also concerned, having read the transcript of her evidence to this committee, about the reasoning Dr. Doherty gave for this happening. In fact, at this stage, I think we need to go back and ask again. As a consequence of this episode, which raises deep concerns as regards how this happened and how unilaterally it could happen without the HSE at a higher level doing anything about it, and while I respect the fact that the issue has been subsequently dealt with, unless a couple of people - there could have been more - put this in a certain forum, it could have continued for a considerably longer period.

My concern relates to a number of matters. The first is the evidence given by Dr. Lorraine Doherty and I think we must have her back in. The second is how management in the HSE over CervicalCheck allowed this to happen. Third, if one looks at what they stated in committee, what they publish on their website and what is actually happening, this is an example of that trail not being accurate. We need to instill public confidence in all the screening programmes. We need to instill public confidence in CervicalCheck. How can we as a committee make sure that happens? I believe we must ask Dr. Doherty to come back in here to explain this. While it has corrected it now, I also believe we need to ask HSE CervicalCheck management to explain in detail the process by which this happened.