John Lahart (Dublin South West, Fianna Fail) | Oireachtas source

Okay. One of the questions exercising many people who are advocates in this space is the age profile of those women who were screened for breast cancer. I found the officials' narrative this morning much more positive than the answer I got to a parliamentary question to the HSE. That was on reducing the age profile of women, or expanding it, basically. The officials have today said they will be actively looking at that for people over 70 years of age and for those under 50 years of age and that it is something that could be explored. In the answer, and also suggested in the opening statement this morning, there is reference to the dangers of expanding the breast cancer screening programme. Is that a concern about alarming the population? What are the misgivings the officials have about expanding it, aside from the cost imposition?