Dr. Nóirín Russell:

I am not here to discuss opinion; I am here to discuss facts. The fact remains that no cervical screening programme in the world detects 100% of cervical cancers. There are interval cancers in every cervical cancer screening programme in the world. That is a straightforward fact. I am delighted the Deputy is raising these questions because they are questions for broader Irish society. Do we accept as a society that we continue with screening because, for the majority, it reduces the risk of developing cancer? If we do that, we have to acknowledge there will be women who are screened for cervical cancer, have a negative result and go on to get cancer. That is the minority, but it is really tough for a woman if she ends up in that minority. We as a society have to decide how we look after women in that minority.

We also have to decide whether we will treat some people with cancer differently from others. Every year, as we have heard from Ms Morrogh, 24,000 people in Ireland are diagnosed with cancer. The majority of these people, approximately 22,600, are diagnosed with cancer when they get symptoms. Some 1,400 people are diagnosed with cancer on a screening programme. We have to decide as a society whether we will treat people who are diagnosed with cancer on a screening programme differently from those who are diagnosed because they present with symptoms.