Neasa Hourigan (Dublin Central, Green Party) | Oireachtas source

I thank all our guests for being here. I know it costs them personally every time they have to tell their story and advocate. I have three questions and we are short on time so I might just ask the three questions and then hand over to the witnesses. Deputy Shortall mentioned the training of doctors. I know that in other jurisdictions, such as the UK and France for example, there is training for pharmacists. When you have small children or healthy children you are more likely to run down to the pharmacy to get stuff for a child you think is fluey. Do the witnesses have any thoughts on that?

Second, today we have talked a lot about children who were very healthy but I know that sepsis often affects people who have underlying conditions. It strikes me, particularly in the US situation, that an overlapping issue here in that a lot of people with chronic illness utilise private services. I am thinking in particular of the hospital at home service. The person I was talking to recently about sepsis had a bad experience with that service and his sepsis was missed for an extended period of time. Is there a concern around how we can reach out to the HSE, and beyond that because we have a two-tier system? How do we reach out to those people with chronic illness who have a tendency to assign issues to their underlying condition?

On the third issue, maybe Mr. Callaghan could speak to this. I know the road back from sepsis is very long. For the person I was talking to it was a two-year process and they are only just back to work now. They needed occupational therapy and counselling.

Could our guests speak to that? Certainly, I would expect that any strategy would not just be about the early stages and identification but would also include that very long road back afterwards.