Mr. Ciar?n Staunton:

Dia daoibh go léir. Níl aon áthas orainn a bheith anseo mar go bhfuil ár mac marbh.

Orlaith and I, along with our daughter, Kathleen, came by our son's grave this morning and that was a preventable trip. His death was preventable. When I spoke in Ireland in 2014 there were 1,851 preventable sepsis deaths and, in 2021, the number had increased to 2,700. We know the families who are here. We know that 15-year-old Lil Red's death was preventable, and his mum and dad are here. We know that the death of James Corcoran's sister, Tracey, was preventable and she left two young children behind. We also know that 42% of hospital beds in Ireland are filled with patients with either sepsis or infection. That is the reality of the numbers.

I thank the Chairman and this committee for hosting these historic hearings. I thank him for inviting my wife, Orlaith, myself and our daughter, Kathleen, to be here today because these are not numbers we are talking about. They are people. They are sons, daughters, sisters and brothers. I want to underline the word "preventable". These are preventable deaths, a preventable buying of coffins and preventable funerals.

My name is Ciarán Staunton. I am from County Mayo and my wife, Orlaith, is from County Louth. Our daughter, Kathleen, is with us. Kathleen was only ten years old when she had to bury her brother, Rory. Many of the members know our tragic story because his death should never have happened. It should never have happened anywhere in the world. What we have tried to do, and will continue to do, is try to ensure that what happened to our son in New York should not happen anywhere ever.

Rory Staunton was 12 years old when he died. Rory loved Ireland and came here every summer. He travelled from Ballydavid to Westport to Drogheda. Indeed, he was a guest here in the Dáil on many occasions with his uncle, Deputy Fergus O'Dowd. Rory is an Irish citizen and is buried with his grandparents in Drogheda.

I have given many speeches about Rory's death and our campaign. I will never be able to verbalise the hell every time we give the speech and we walk by his grave, which is a preventable graveside, because we are talking about the loss of a child, and the struggle to keep going. The last line of our speech continues always to be "his life could have been saved". When we were invited here by the committee we said "yes, it would be appropriate". As one can see from the statistics handed out by the HSE the numbers are increasing and the line that displays fatalities is ever increasing. These are "preventable" fatalities.

I will now hand over to my wife, Orlaith.